Heterogeneity Among Mexico's Micro-enterprises

Heterogeneity Among Mexico's Micro-enterprises PDF Author: Wendy V. Cunningham
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 1911103822
Category : Business people
Languages : en
Pages : 47

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Heterogeneity Among Mexico's Micro-enterprises

Heterogeneity Among Mexico's Micro-enterprises PDF Author: Wendy V. Cunningham
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 1911103822
Category : Business people
Languages : en
Pages : 47

Get Book Here

Book Description


Heterogeneity Among Mexico's Micro-Enterprises

Heterogeneity Among Mexico's Micro-Enterprises PDF Author: Wendy Cunningham
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 43

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Book Description
The small firm sector com ...

Fiscal Federalism and Macroeconomic Governance

Fiscal Federalism and Macroeconomic Governance PDF Author: Anwar Shah
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Control fiscal
Languages : en
Pages : 51

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Book Description
November 1998 Shah concludes that, contrary to a common misconception, decentralized fiscal systems offer more potential for improved macroeconomic governance than do centralized fiscal systems, because they require greater clarity about the roles of various players and decisionmakers and-to ensure fair play-greater transparency in rules governing interactions. In analyzing the institutional environment for macroeconomic management, Shah discusses monetary policy, fiscal policy, and subnational borrowing. In analyzing the macroeconomic dimensions of securing an economic union, he discusses the regulatory environment, tax coordination, transfer payments and social insurance, intergovernmental fiscal transfers, and regional equity. Finally, he discusses the challenges of globalization and draws lessons from experience about fiscal reform in developing countries: Among them: * Monetary policy is best entrusted to an independent central bank with a mandate for price stability. * Fiscal rules accompanied by gatekeeper intergovernmental councils or committees provide a useful framework for fiscal discipline and coordination of fiscal policy. * The integrity and independence of the financial sector contribute to fiscal prudence in the public sector. * To ensure fiscal discipline, governments at all levels must be made to face the financial consequences of their decisions. * Societal norms and consensus about the roles of various levels of government and limits to their authority are vital to the success of decentralized decisionmaking. * Tax decentralization is a prerequisite for subnational access to credit markets. * Higher-level institutional assistance may be needed to finance local capital projects. * An internal common market is best preserved by constitutional guarantees. * Intergovernmental transfers in developing countries undermine fiscal discipline and accountability while building transfer dependencies that cause a slow economic strangulation of fiscally disadvantaged regions. * Periodic review of jurisdictional assignments is essential to realign responsibilities with changing economic and political realities. * Finally, and contrary to a common misconception, decentralized fiscal systems offer more potential for improved macroeconomic governance than do centralized fiscal systems. This paper-a product of the Country and Regional Relations Division, Operations Evaluation Department-is part of a larger effort in the department to learn lessons of experience in improving public sector performance in developing countries. The author may be contacted at [email protected].

The Real Impact of Financial Shocks

The Real Impact of Financial Shocks PDF Author: Ilker DomaƧ
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Bancos - Corea
Languages : en
Pages : 36

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Book Description
November 1998 To what extent did tightening monetary policy magnify the East Asian crisis through its adverse effects on credit supply? In the Republic of Korea, interest rate spreads, which capture credit channel effects, influence economic activity, and these effects are disproportionately larger for small and medium-size enterprises. So policymakers who neglect credit channel effects might be overkilling the economy and altogether overlooking the disproportionate effects of monetary and financial shocks on some sectors. The debates surrounding the recent East Asian crisis have focused not only on causes but also on policy actions in the wake of the initial shock. This has raised questions about the relationship between monetary policy and market confidence. Specifically, would rising interest rates bolster or depress market confidence? To answer this question requires assessing whether, and to what extent, monetary and financial shocks are magnified through the economy via the credit channel. DomaƧ and Ferri focus on the Republic of Korea-a particularly good case for testing credit channel effects-with two objectives: * To ascertain whether and to what extent interest rate spreads could help predict subsequent fluctuations in real economic activity. * To test whether small and medium-size enterprises suffer more than other businesses do from the adverse effects of the credit channel. The authors'empirical findings support the hypothesis that spreads that capture credit channel effects do indeed influence economic activity. Specifically, spreads contain significant information for predicting the future course of industrial production. The effect is, as one might have assumed, disproportionately larger for small and medium-size enterprises. Thus policymakers, in Korea and elsewhere, who neglect credit channel effects might be overkilling the economy and altogether overlooking the disproportionate effects of monetary and financial shocks on various segments of the economy. This paper-a product of the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Sector Unit and the Financial Sector Development Sector Unit, East Asia and Pacific Region-is part of a larger effort in the region to analyze the patterns and consequences of the East Asian crisis, with particular reference to the link between the real and financial sectors. The authors may be contacted at [email protected] or [email protected].

Land Institutions and Land Markets

Land Institutions and Land Markets PDF Author: Klaus W. Deininger
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Derechos de propiedad
Languages : en
Pages : 49

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Book Description
November 1998 Secure property rights to land and well-functioning land rental and sales markets are essential for creating investment incentives, improving the allocation of land, and developing financial markets. Yet regulatory restrictions on land rental and sales and regulatory frameworks providing inadequate tenure security are common. This paper looks at the impact of imperfections in other factor markets and the costs and benefits of government intervention to improve the security of property rights and the functioning of land markets and draws conclusions about land policy issues. In agrarian societies land serves as the main means not only for generating a livelihood but often also for accumulating wealth and transferring it between generations. How land rights are assigned therefore determines households' ability to generate subsistence and income, their social and economic status (and in many cases their collective identity), their incentive to exert nonobservable effort and make investments, and often their ability to access financial markets or to make arrangements for smoothing consumption and income. With imperfections in other markets, the institutions governing the allocation of land rights and the functioning of land markets will have implications for overall efficiency as well as equity. The authors examine how property rights in land evolve from a situation of land abundance. They discuss factors affecting the costs and benefits of individual land rights and highlight the implications of tenure security for investment incentives. They also review factors affecting participation in land sales and rental markets, particularly the characteristics of the agricultural production process, labor supervision cost, credit access, the risk characteristics of an individual's asset portfolio, and the transaction costs associated with market participation. These factors will affect land sales and rental markets differently. Removing obstacles to the smooth functioning of land rental markets and taking measures to enhance potential tenants' endowments and bargaining power can significantly increase both the welfare of the poor and the overall efficiency of resource allocation. Drawing on their conceptual discussion, the authors draw policy conclusions about the transition from communal to individual and more formal land rights, steps that might be taken to improve the functioning of land sales and rental markets, and the scope for redistributive land reform. This paper--a product of Rural Development, Development Research Group--was prepared as background for the forthcoming Handbook on Agricultural Economics. The authors may be contacted at [email protected] or [email protected].

Measuring the Dynamic Gains from Trade

Measuring the Dynamic Gains from Trade PDF Author: Romain Wacziarg
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Capital
Languages : en
Pages : 57

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Book Description
November 1998 Empirical analysis confirms that a policy of trade openness has a strong positive impact on economic growth. The accelerated accumulation of physical capital accounts for more than half this growth. Enhanced technological transmissions and improvements in the quality of macroeconomic policy each account for about 20 percent of the effect of openness on growth. Wacziarg investigates the links between trade policy and economic growth using data from a panel of 57 countries from 1970-89. This is the first attempt to empirically evaluate, in a cross-country context, the respective roles of various theories of dynamic gains from trade in explaining the observed positive impact of trade openness on economic growth. Wacziarg uses a new measure of trade openness, based on the effective policy component of trade shares, in a simultaneous equations system aimed at identifying the effect of trade policy on several determinants of growth. The results suggest that a policy of trade openness has a strong positive impact on economic growth. The accelerated accumulation of physical capital accounts for more than half this effect. Enhanced technological transmissions and improvements in the quality of macroeconomic policy each account for about 20 percent of the impact of trade openness on growth. This decomposition is robust to alternative specifications and time periods. Wacziarg also successfully tests whether the empirical methodology captures all or most of the effects of trade policy on growth. The lack of statistically significant results concerning several other channels may be due to measurement problems. The black market premium may be a weak proxy for the efficiency of the price system. Moreover, international technological transmissions are very hard to measure, so there may be a downward bias in the estimates based on the manufactured exports channel, and a corresponding overstatement of other channels. This paper-a product of the Development Prospects Group, Development Economics-is part of a larger effort in the Bank to analyze the relationship between openness and economic growth. The author may be contacted at [email protected].

GATT Experience with Safeguards

GATT Experience with Safeguards PDF Author: J. M. Finger
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Acuerdos arancelarios
Languages : en
Pages : 34

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Book Description
October 1998 Suggested guidelines for a safeguards process that emphasizes an import restriction's impact on the domestic economy: Domestically, who would benefit from the proposed restriction and who would lose, and by how much? And how would import-using interests be affected? Realizing that trade liberalization would require periodic adjustments because of problems in particular industries, GATT's framers provided that tariff reductions that led to such problems could be renegotiated; in an emergency a country could raise its tariff first and negotiate compensation with the principal exporting countries later. GATT lists many provisions that allow import restrictions, provisions that, over time, have proven quite fungible. Renegotiations were replaced by negotiated quantitative restraints (VERs), which were replaced by antidumping. The problem (troublesome imports) was always the same, but the instruments changed. And none of the instruments made much political or economic sense. They did not help a government isolate those import restrictions for which the benefits to the domestic economy would exceed the costs. And politically, the procedures through which renegotiations, VERs, or antidumping actions are decided provide a public tribune for interests that would benefit from protection but provide no voice for domestic interests that would bear the costs of restricted access to imports. Finger offers guidelines for a safeguards process that makes more economic and political sense: * Identify the costs and losers as well as the benefits and winners. * Be clear that the action is an exception to the principles underlying the liberalization program. Emphasize that too many such exceptions would constitute abandonment of the liberalization program and its benefits. Included in the investigation process should be an expression of the costs the proposed restriction would impose. * Don't sanctify the criteria for the action. Procedures should not presume, as antidumping does, that there is some good reason for granting exceptions. Providing a list of good reasons invites protection-seekers to demonstrate that they qualify and places the government in the position of having to demonstrate that they do not. Procedures should stress that the function of the review is to identify the benefits, costs, and domestic winners and losers from the action requested. This paper is a product of Trade, Development Research Group. The author may be contacted at [email protected].

 PDF Author:
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 43

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Book Description


Youth at Risk in Latin America and the Caribbean

Youth at Risk in Latin America and the Caribbean PDF Author:
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821375210
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 326

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Book Description
Youth at Risk in Latin America provides evidence-based guidance to policymakers that will help increase the effectiveness of their youth investment program. Drawing on the authors' detailed analyses, the book describes twenty-three policies and programs that youth development experts agree are the basis of a quality youth development portfolio, from early childhood development programs to parent training to cash transfers for positive behaviors. It also lays out strategies for implementing this effective youth portfolio in a budget-constrained environment by reallocation of resources away from.

Informality

Informality PDF Author: Guillermo Perry
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821370936
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 270

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Book Description
Analyzes informality in Latin America, exploring root causes and reasons for and implications of its growth. This book uses two distinct but complementary lenses. It concludes that reducing informality levels and overcoming the "culture of informality" will require actions to increase aggregate productivity in the economy.