This thesis comprises three essays on the international movement of merchandise and people. The first essay measures the effects of foreign aid flows on a donor's merchandise exports. On average, donor countries tie approximately 50% of their foreign aid to exports, but the export stimulation of aid may exceed the amount that is directly tied. This essay uses the gravity model of trade to statistically test the link between aid and export expansion. The results suggest that aid is associated with an increase in exports of goods amounting to 120% of the aid. The essay also makes comparisons among donors and finds that Japan, which has drawn harsh criticism for using aid to gain unfair trade advantages, derives less merchandise exports from aid than the average donor. The second essay investigates the effects of immigration on Canada's pattern of trade. I derive three alternative functional forms capturing the relationship between immigration and trade based on the proposition that immigrants use their superior "market intelligence" to exploit new trade opportunities. I then employ province-level trade data with over 150 trading partners to identify immigrant effects and obtain results suggesting that immigrants account for over 10% of Canada's exports. The third essay addresses the question of whether tax differences contribute toward the brain drain from Canada to the U.S. This essay tests whether the U.S.'s lower taxes draw Canadians south by examining a sample of Canadians living in Canada and a sample of Canadians living in the U.S. Using information from these samples I estimate how much these individuals would earn in the opposite country and estimate the taxes they would pay. I find that the people who have the most to gain in income and in tax-savings are the most likely to choose to live in the U.S., and thus corroborate the claim that tax differences contribute toward Canada's brain drain. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

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Au milieu du XIXe siècle, la Province du Canada obtient progressivement une plus grande autonomie financière que ce soit en raison des revendications des responsables coloniaux ou par des changements dans la politique impériale. Ces changements arrivent au moment où s’instaure un nouveau mode de gouvernance politique, ce qui entraîne de nombreux débats sur la position que l’État doit occuper. La place de la taxation est centrale dans ces préoccupations puisqu’elle révèle des enjeux à dimension démocratique et de gouvernance. Ce mémoire propose d’explorer sous l’angle de la rationalisation de la pensée étatique, en analysant les débats parlementaires de la Province du Canada entre 1841 et 1856. La rationalisation permet la création de catégories et la normalisation du droit, ce qui entraîne l’universalisation des mesures fiscales. Elle s’observe à travers la mise en place d’une logique de l’utilisateur-payeur pour les services publics et un déclin des critères moraux pour justifier la taxation. / In the mid-nineteenth century, the Province of Canada gradually gained greater financial independence, as the result both of colonial demands and changes in broader imperial policy. These changes occurred at a time when the role of the state itself was changing, raising debates about the position it should occupy. Taxation was central to these concerns, since it brought up issues concerning both democracy and governance. This thesis explores the debate on taxation from the perspective of the rationalization of thinking about the state. It focuses on the parliamentary debates of the Province of Canada between 1841 and 1856. Rationalization led to the creation of categories and the standardization of law, which in turn resulted in the universalization of fiscal measures. This can be seen through the introduction of the user-pay principle for public services and the decline in recourse to moral criteria to justify taxation.