Download or read book Growth Implosions Debt Explosions and My Aunt Marilyn written by William Russell Easterly and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The worldwide slowdown in growth after 1975 played an important role in the debt crisis of the middle-income countries in the 1980s, the crisis of the heavily indebted poor countries in the 1980s and 1990s, and the increased public debt burden of the industrial countries in the 1980s and 1990s.
Download or read book Growth Implosions Debt Explosions and My Aunt Marilyn written by William Easterly and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 35 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The worldwide slowdown in growth after 1975 played an important role in the debt crisis of the middle-income countries in the 1980s, the crisis of the heavily indebted poor countries in the 1980s and 1990s, and the increased public debt burden of the industrial countries in the 1980s and 1990s.quot;Never take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.quot;-Saying passed along by author's Aunt MarilynThe worldwide slowdown in growth after 1975 was a major negative fiscal shock. Slower growth lowers the present value of tax revenues and primary surpluses and thus makes a given level of debt more burdensome. Most countries failed to adjust to the negative fiscal consequences of the growth implosion, so public-debt-to-GDP ratios exploded.The growth slowdown therefore played an important role in the debt crisis of the middle-income countries in the 1980s, the crisis of the heavily indebted poor countries (HIPCs) in the 1980s and 1990s, and the increased public debt burden of the industrial countries in the 1980s and 1990s.Moreover, the HIPCs' debt problems were worse than elsewhere because, as a result of poor policies, these countries grew more slowly after 1975 than other low-income countries.Econometric tests and fiscal solvency accounting confirm the important role of growth in debt crises.This paper - a product of Macroeconomics and Growth, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to study economic growth and fiscal sustainability. The author may be contacted at [email protected].
Download or read book Growth Implosions Debt Explosions and My Aunt Marilyn written by William Easterly and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: January 2001 The worldwide slowdown in growth after 1975 played an important role in the debt crisis of the middle-income countries in the 1980s, the crisis of the heavily indebted poor countries in the 1980s and 1990s, and the increased public debt burden of the industrial countries in the 1980s and 1990s. "Never take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night."--Saying passed along by author's Aunt Marilyn The worldwide slowdown in growth after 1975 was a major negative fiscal shock. Slower growth lowers the present value of tax revenues and primary surpluses and thus makes a given level of debt more burdensome. Most countries failed to adjust to the negative fiscal consequences of the growth implosion, so public-debt-to-GDP ratios exploded. The growth slowdown therefore played an important role in the debt crisis of the middle-income countries in the 1980s, the crisis of the heavily indebted poor countries (HIPCs) in the 1980s and 1990s, and the increased public debt burden of the industrial countries in the 1980s and 1990s. Moreover, the HIPCs' debt problems were worse than elsewhere because, as a result of poor policies, these countries grew more slowly after 1975 than other low-income countries. Econometric tests and fiscal solvency accounting confirm the important role of growth in debt crises. This paper--a product of Macroeconomics and Growth, Development Research Group--is part of a larger effort in the group to study economic growth and fiscal sustainability. The author may be contacted at [email protected].
Download or read book Infrastructure Coverage and the Poor written by Kristin Komives and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 56 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The poor in most parts of the world may have electricity (especially in urban areas), but they rarely have water, sewer, and telephone services. When they gain access to local services, however, many do decide to connect.
Download or read book The Uniqueness of Short term Collateralization written by Leora Klapper and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A secured letter-of-credit loan allows a lender to make larger loans than would be permissible on an unsecured basis, maximizing a risky borrower's investment capital. Empirical evidence shows that secured letters of credit are used by borrowers who are informationally opaque and have higher observable risk. Such borrowers also have fewer growth opportunities and are less likely to pay dividends.
Download or read book Gender Dimensions of Pension Reform in the Former Soviet Union written by Paulette Castel and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The authors analyze the gender implications of pension reform in Kazakhstan, the Kygyz Republic, Latvia, and Moldova. The new systems deliberately penalize early retirement and reward longer careers, so that with no change in behavior or policy, women's pensions will be lower than men's on average. Still, the implicit financial returns for women remain higher on average than returns for men, because of women's longer life expectancy and because of redistributory minimum pensions. Overall, however, the net change in wealth resulting from the reforms will be larger on average for men than for women, because they will work longer and get a larger pension. Women's longer life expectancy means that women can expect to spend the last years of their lives alone. If their pensions are too low because of their work histories, poverty among elderly women may increase.
Download or read book Administrative Costs and the Organization of Individual Retirement Account Systems written by Estelle James and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Organizing individual retirement accounts through the institutional market and with constrained choice could substantially lower administrative costs. The tradeoff: rebidding problems, weaker performance incentives, inflexibility in the face of unforeseen contingencies, and an increased probability of corruption, collusion, and regulatory capture.
Download or read book The Design of Incentives for Health Care Providers in Developing Countries written by Jeffrey S. Hammer and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whatever the theoretical attractiveness of certain policy options, the fact that public employees are people who make independent decisions about their careers and lifestyles can set bounds on how well government agencies can deliver promised services, such as universal health care, including in rural areas. Hammer and Jack examine the design and limitations of incentives for health care providers to serve in rural areas in developing countries. Governments face two problems: it is costly to compensate well-trained urban physicians enough to relocate to rural areas, and it is difficult to ensure quality care when monitoring performance is costly or impossible.
Download or read book Checks and Balances Private Information and the Credibility of Monetary Commitments written by Philip Keefer and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In economically volatile conditions in which it is more difficult for the public to distinguish inflation deliberately generated by government from inflation created by unanticipated economic shocks, the anti-inflationary effect of central bank independence will be unchanged but the effectiveness of exchange rate pegs will be significantly improved. Keefer and Stasavage develop and test several new hypotheses about the anti-inflationary effect of central bank independence and exchange rate pegs in the context of different institutions and different degrees of citizen information about government policies.
Download or read book Trade Policy Reform in the East Asian Transition Economies written by Will Martin and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 1999 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: January 2001 There has been no single magic formula for the success of the East Asian transition economies (Cambodia, China, Lao People's Democratic Republic, and Vietnam), whose performance in export and income growth has been strikingly better than that of transition economies in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. Most of the trade policy problems that remain in these East Asian economies appear to be problems more of development than of transition. The performance of the East Asian transition economies in export and income growth has been strikingly better than that of countries in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The East Asian economies have achieved remarkably high growth rates in outputs and exports without the often large declines in output and exports observed in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. East Asian reformers have successfully made many of the parallel changes needed in both domestic and trade policies to secure export and income growth. (It makes no sense, for example, to introduce the trade policy instruments of a market economy when the domestic economy is still based on central planning.) But there has been no single magic formula for their success. Martin discusses what each of the economies (Cambodia, China, Lao People's Democratic Republic, and Vietnam) has done. China experienced an extended transition process; the transition was much shorter in other East Asian transition economies--especially Cambodia. Several of the East Asian transition economies used accession to a regional arrangement as part of their reform strategy. China focused mainly on unilateral reforms and, more recently, reforms associated with its accession to the World Trade Organization. Most have made extensive use of policies to attract foreign investment and to mitigate the burden of protection on manufacturing exporters. Most of the remaining trade policy problems, although difficult, appear to be problems more of development than of transition. This paper--a product of Trade, Development Research Group--is part of a larger effort in the group to understand the role of trade reform in successful development and poverty alleviation. The author may be contacted at [email protected].
Download or read book Market presence contestability and the terms of trade effects of regional integration written by Maurice Schiff and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 1994 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book When Do Special Interests Run Rampant written by Philip Keefer and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 54 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Government responses to banking crises are less likely to favor special interest groups when elections are near, voters are better informed about the costs of inefficient government decisions, and governments have multiple veto players. Keefer investigates the political determinants of government decisions that benefit special interest groups, especially government decisions to deal with banking crises. He finds that the better informed the voters, the more proximate elections, and the larger the number of political veto players (conditional on the costs to voters of relevant policy decisions), the smaller the government's fiscal transfers are to the financial sector and the less likely the government is to exercise forbearance in dealing with insolvent financial institutions.
Download or read book Measuring Equity in Health Care Financing written by Adam Wagstaff and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The World Health Organization's latest World health report proposes an index of fairness in health care financing. The index's chief weakness is that it cannot discriminate among progressive, regressive, and horizontally inequitable health financing systems. An alternative approach proposed in the early 1990s is shown to do a better job.
Download or read book Recapitalizing Banking Systems written by Patrick Honohan and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 52 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After a banking crisis, when authorities have decided to use budgetary funds to help restructure a large failed bank or banking system, apparent conflicts between various goals (involving incentives for the new bank management, for the government's budget, and for monetary stability) can be resolved by suitably designing financial instruments and appropriately allocating responsibility between different arms of government.
Download or read book Measuring Poverty Dynamics and Inequality in Transition Economies written by Erzo F. P. Luttmer and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 1999 with total page 42 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Estimates of income inequality and the dynamics of poverty are highly sensitive to measurement error and transitory shocks in micro-level data. The apparent high levels of economic mobility in Poland and Russia are driven largely by transitory shocks and noisy data. There is a real risk of an entrenched underclass emerging in these transition economies.
Download or read book International Provision of Trade Services Trade and Fragmentation written by Alan V. Deardorff and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2001 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author examines the special role that trade liberalization in services industries can play in stimulating trade in both services, and goods. International trade in goods requires inputs from such trade services as transportation, insurance, and finance, for example. Restrictions on services across borders, and within foreign countries add costs, and barriers to international trade. Liberalizing trade in services could also facilitate trade in goods, providing more benefits than one might expect from analysis merely of the services trade. To emphasize the point, the author notes that the benefits for trade are arguably enhanced by the phenomenon of fragmentation. The more that production processes become split across locations, with the fragments tied together, and coordinated by various trade services, the greater the gains from reductions in the costs of services. The incentives for such fragmentation can be greater across countries, than within countries, because of the greater differences in factor prices, and technologies. But the service costs of international fragmentation can also be larger, especially if regulations, and restrictions impede the international provision of services. As a result, trade liberalization in services can stimulate the fragmentation of production of both goods, and services, thus increasing international trade, and the gains from trade even further. Since fragmentation seems to characterize an increasing portion of world specialization, the importance of service liberalization is growing apace.
Download or read book Household Schooling Decisions in Rural Pakistan written by Michael Lokshin and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 1999 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: February 2001 An analysis of a field survey to investigate household decisions about schooling in rural Pakistan suggests that hiring more female teachers and providing more primary schools for girls closer to villages will improve the chances of rural Pakistani girls entering school and staying enrolled. Human capital investments in Pakistan are performing poorly: school enrollment is low, the high school dropout rate is high, and there is a definite gender gap in education. Sawada and Lokshin conducted field surveys in 25 Pakistani villages and integrated their field observations, economic theory, and econometric analysis to investigate the sequential nature of education decisions--because current outcomes depend not only on current decisions but also on past decisions. Their full-information maximum likelihood estimate of the sequential schooling decision model reveals important dynamics affecting the gender gap in education, the effects of transitory income and wealth, and intrahousehold resource allocation patterns. They find, among other things, that in rural Pakistan: * There is a high educational retention rate, conditional on school entry, and that male and female schooling progression rates become comparable at higher levels of education. * A household's human and physical assets and changes in its income significantly affect children's education patterns. Birth order affects siblings' competition for resources. * Serious supply-side constraints on village girls' primary education suggest the importance of supply-side policy interventions in Pakistan's rural primary education--for example, providing more girls' primary schools close to villages and employing more female teachers. This paper--a product of Poverty and Human Resources, Development Research Group--is part of a larger effort in the group to study the role of gender in the context of the household, institutions, and society. The authors may be contacted at [email protected] or [email protected].
