Briefs: 2011 2010   2009   2008   2007  2006  2005 ¦ Blogs 

The Influence of Society on Preferences
Fall 2011 -  Changes in preferences in response to changes in social institutions may be central to economic and societal change. Research Digest

Decentralization and Municipal Spending Ability in Developing Countries
Fall 2011 - For fiscal decentralization to succeed, budget allocations need to match not only local needs but also local capacity. Research Digest

Gross Capital Flows: Dynamics and Crises
Fall 2011 - Capital flows by foreign and domestic agents seem to be driven by shocks that affect them asymmetrically. Understanding both types of flows seems crucial. Research Digest

How Much Does Infrastructure Contribute to GDP Growth? 
Summer 2011 - A big push in infrastructure investment may entail trade-offs and distortions that could substantially reduce the net effect on growth. Research Digest 

The Investment Climate When Firms Have Climate Control
Winter 2011 - Comparing measures of official regulation with firms’ actual experience suggests new ways of thinking about investment climate. Research Digest 

How Fast Can Egypt Grow?
Winter 2011 - Current rates of national saving in Egypt will not lead to high rates of economic growth unless accompanied by forceful productivity improvements. Research Digest 

Bank's Contribution to the G-20 (November 2011)
G-20 Leaders Summit- Cannes 

Too Poor to Grow
Winter 2010 - Higher poverty leads to slower growth by deterring investment. Research Digest 

Bank's Contribution to the G-20 (June 2010)
Infrastructure and Growth
Resilience to External Crises 

Legacy of the Caste System in the Enforcement of Norms
Fall 2009 - Denial of basic social and economic rights may diminish the repressed group’s ability to organize collective action. Research Digest 

Making (More) Sense of Subjective Rankings
Fall 2009 - Do firms’ subjective rankings of constraints to their business reflect reality? Evidence suggests that they do. Research Digest 

Globalization and International Capital Raisings
Summer 2009 - A new study explores the characteristics and behavior of firms that raise capital abroad.  Research Digest 

Back to Global Imbalances?
July 2009 - Forces unleashed by the 2008-2009 financial crisis have kept U.S. assets attractive and the dollar strong, contrary to what many observers expected. Over the long run real sector and financial sector forces are likely to impose a correction, perhaps involving a depreciation of the dollar and a major reallocation of international portfolios. Research Brief 

Political Incentives Driving Fiscal Policy
February 26, 2009   New results on the political determinants of fiscal policy overturn conventional wisdom, and lend themselves to innovative institutional approaches to reform. Research Brief (technical)

Spite and Development: Altruistic Punishment vs. Spiteful Punishment
October 15, 2008 - An experimental trust game conducted in one of the least developed states in India shows that spiteful punishment is surprisingly widespread, and that it could also be a considerable barrier to social and economic cooperation. Research Brief  

Governance Matters VII : Aggregate and Individual Governance Indicators 1996-2007
June, 2008 -  A new working paper on Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) covering 212 countries and territories and measuring six dimensions of governance between 1996 and 2007 reflect the views on governance of public sector, private sector and NGO experts, as well as thousands of citizen and firm survey respondents worldwide. The authors also explicitly report the margins of error accompanying each country estimate. They find that even after taking margins of error into account, the WGI permit meaningful cross-country comparisons as well as monitoring progress over time. In less than a decade, a substantial number of countries exhibit statistically significant improvements in at least one dimension of governance, while other countries exhibit deterioration in some dimensions.Working Paper (technical)  The Empirics of Governance Seminar, May 2008 

Development Impact of the War on Drugs  
Summer 2008 - The war on drugs has failed to achieve its objectives—and may cause more damage than the drugs themselves.  Research Digest (nontechnical) 

Developing Countries: A Strategy for Macroeconomic Stability
March 7, 2008  - With financial markets being in a state of turmoil, developing countries—often vulnerable to shocks from the outside that are beyond their control—are concerned about possible threats to their own macroeconomic stability.  Featured Research Article  

February 15, 2008 -  Recent research shows that when informality---defined as self-reported lack of tax compliance by firms---is high, access to credit is low. The observed credit constraints most likely relate to the lower value placed on balance sheets and financial disclosure by credit institutions in environments where tax evasion is diffused. Research Brief (technical) 

 

Post-Conflict Risks
April 2007  Paul Collier, Anke Hoeffler, and Mans Soderbom
Summary (nontechnical) 

Post-Conflict Aid, Real Exchange Rate Adjustment, and Catch-up Growth
April 2007 Ibrahim Elbadawi, Linda Kaltani, and Klaus Schmidt-Hebbel
Summary (nontechnical) | Post-Conflict Working Paper (technical) 

Ethnic Polarization and the Duration of Civil Wars
April 2007 Jose G. Montalvo and Marta Reynal-Querol
Summary (nontechnical) | Post-Conflict Working Paper (technical) 

Stock Market Development under Globalization: Whither the Gains from Reforms?
April 2007  Augusto de la Torre, Juan Carlos Gozzi, and Sergio L. Schmukler
Summary (nontechnical) |  Draft (technical) 

The Welfare Effects of a Large Depreciation: The Case of Egypt 2000-2005 
April 2007   Aart Kraay 
Between 2000 and 2005 Egypt experienced a large nominal depreciation of the Egyptian pound. Much of it was concentrated around a sharp devaluation in early 2003, and over the entire period 2000-2005 the exchange rate depreciated by 27 percent in trade-weighted terms. This paper assesses the welfare implications of the changes in consumer prices accompanying this large movement in the exchange rate. Summary (nontechnical) | Working Paper (technical)

 

The Composition of Growth Matters for Poverty Alleviation
Dec. 2006 Norman V. Loayza and Claudio Raddatz
Summary (nontechnical) | Working Paper (technical) 

The Structural Determinants of External Vulnerability
Dec. 2006  Norman V. Loayza and Claudio Raddatz
Summary (nontechnical) | Working Paper (technical) 

 

For Maximum Economic Growth from Trade Liberalization, Countries Should Consider Complementary Domestic Reforms
December 5, 2005   Recent World Bank research suggests that countries should complement trade openness with greater flexibility of their investment climate and labor markets, and pay more attention to other key areas such as governance and infrastructure, among others. As multilateral trade policies are debated during the Doha round of trade negotiations, it is clear that developing countries seeking to boost growth generated by trade liberalization should also build strategies for other domestic reforms. Featured Research Article