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  • McKenzie, David  (72)
  • Lederman, Daniel  (58)
  • Washington, D.C : The World Bank  (130)
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  • 1
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    Online Resource
    Stages of Diversification Redux (2024)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (44 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Assem Mohammed G Hassan Ahmed, Hoda Stages of Diversification Redux
    Keywords: Development Trajectories ; Economic Concentration ; Economic Diversification ; Economic Growth ; Macroeconomics and Economic Growth ; Resource Poor Countries ; Resource Rich Countries
    Abstract: The existing literature on development and economic diversification finds an inverted-U function between these two variables, whereby economies diversify as they grow up to a point, after which they start specializing. This paper contributes to this literature by investigating the stages of diversification over the course of development during the past 57 years. The paper emphasizes the trajectories of resource-rich and resource-poor countries, an issue that has not been covered by the extant literature. In addition, the paper studies the stages of diversification across three dimensions, namely employment, value-added, and exports. Additionally, it examines the relationship for services. Non-parametric estimations suggest a U-shaped curve between measures of economic concentration and per capita income levels, which is in line with existing evidence. However, these patterns are mainly driven by between-country rather than within-country variation, a finding that had been ignored in the existing literature. Diversification patterns also differ across resource-rich and resource-poor countries: Employment and value added in resource-rich countries are on average more concentrated at low levels of development while in resource poor countries, they are more concentrated at high levels of development. In contrast, at all levels of development, exports are more concentrated in resource-rich countries
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10709
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  • 2
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    Plant Closings and the Labor Market Outcomes of Displaced Workers : Evidence from Mexico (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (35 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Arias, Francisco Plant Closings and the Labor Market Outcomes of Displaced Workers: Evidence from Mexico
    Keywords: Difference in Difference ; Education ; Education and Employment ; Employment and Unemployment ; Gender ; Gender and Economic Policy ; Gender and Employment ; Job Displacement ; Job Loss Impact by Education ; Labor Market ; Poverty Reduction ; Wages ; Wages, Compensation and Benefits
    Abstract: This paper investigates the impacts of job displacement on subsequent labor market outcomes, focusing on differentiated effects by educational groups and gender. The findings show that job separations caused by plant closings result in sizable and long-lasting wage reductions, with an average decline of -7.5 percent over a nine-year period relative to workers who did not experience job losses. A stronger effect is estimated for highly educated workers than for low educated workers, with initial effects being 18.4 and 9 percent wage drops, respectively. For working hours, the effect on low educated workers is double the effect on highly educated workers, with 3.0 and 1.5 additional hours per week, respectively. Using the rotating panel of the survey, difference in differences coefficients are estimated, removing time-invariant individual heterogeneity. Compared to ordinary least squares, the difference in differences estimates reduce the magnitude of the average impacts of plant closing on wages, from -7.5 to -4.7 percent, and on working hours from 1.4 to 0.53 additional hours. These results suggest that the ordinary least squares estimates are upwardly biased due to omitted individual worker heterogeneity. The paper discusses another potential remaining source of endogeneity concerning the quality of the match between employers and workers
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10536
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  • 3
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    Digital Payments and the COVID-19 Shock : The Role of Preexisting Conditions in Banking, Infrastructure, Human Capabilities, and Digital Regulation (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (47 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Cull, Robert Digital Payments and the COVID-19 Shock: The Role of Preexisting Conditions in Banking, Infrastructure, Human Capabilities, and Digital Regulation
    Keywords: Covid-19 Lockdown ; Covid-19 Shock ; Digital Divide ; Digital Infrastructure ; Digital Payment ; Finance and Financial Sector Development ; Financial Inclusion ; ICT Policy and Strategies ; Information and Communication Technologies
    Abstract: Treating data collected pre- and post-COVID-19 as a quasi-experiment, this paper examines the importance of presumed enablers and safeguards in driving the observed expansion of digital payments and digital financial inclusion. The analysis interacts drivers of digital payment usage with a country-specific proxy of the severity of the COVID-19 shock, leveraging variation in both the drivers and the quasi-treatment (the COVID-19 shock) to identify the parameters. Although regulation of banks and digital economic activity were correlated with digital payments before and during the pandemic, the capabilities of users and connectivity (to electricity, the internet, and mobile telephony) were responsible for increased use of digital financial services in response to the shock. An interpretation is that governments and the private sector were able to overcome underdeveloped banking systems and weak regulation of the digital economy, but only where there was adequate digital infrastructure, connectivity, and a high share of the population that understood and could make use of digital payments
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10603
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  • 4
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    Data Transparency and GDP Growth Forecast Errors (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (39 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Gatti, Roberta Data Transparency and GDP Growth Forecast Errors
    Keywords: Data Transparency ; Economic Forecasting ; Economic Outlook ; Forecast Error ; GDP Growth Forecast ; Macroeconomics and Economic Growth ; Optimism ; Statistical Capacity
    Abstract: This paper examines the role of a country's data transparency in explaining gross domestic product growth forecast errors. It reports four sets of results that have not been previously reported in the existing literature. First, forecast errors-the difference between forecasted and realized gross domestic product growth-are large. Globally, between 2010 and 2020, the average same-year forecast error was 1.3 percentage points for the World Bank's forecasts published in January of each year, and 1.5 percentage points for the International Monetary Fund's January forecasts. Second, the Middle East and North Africa region has the largest forecast errors compared to other regions. Third, data capacity and transparency significantly explain forecast errors. On average, an improvement in a country's Statistical Capacity Index, a measure of data capacity and transparency, is associated with a decline in absolute forecast errors. A one standard deviation increase in the log of the Statistical Capacity Index is associated with a decline in absolute forecast errors by 0.44 percentage point for World Bank forecasts and 0.49 percentage point for International Monetary Fund forecasts. The results are robust to a battery of control variables and robustness checks. Fourth, the role of the overall data ecosystem, not just those elements related to gross domestic product growth forecasting, is important for the accuracy of gross domestic product growth forecasts. Finally, gross domestic product growth forecasts from the World Bank are more accurate and less optimistic than those from the International Monetary Fund and the private sector
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10406
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  • 5
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    Bayesian Impact Evaluation with Informative Priors : An Application to a Colombian Management and Export Improvement Program (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (68 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Iacovone, Leonardo Bayesian Impact Evaluation with Informative Priors: An Application to a Colombian Management and Export Improvement Program
    Keywords: Bayesian Impact Evaluation ; Competition Policy ; Competitiveness and Competition Policy ; Economic Theory and Research ; Export Competitiveness ; International Economics and Trade ; Macroeconomics and Economic Growth ; Management ; Prior Elicitation ; Private Sector Development ; Randomized Experiment ; Social Policy Evaluation Method
    Abstract: Policymakers often test expensive new programs on relatively small samples. Formally incorporating informative Bayesian priors into impact evaluation offers the promise to learn more from these experiments. A Colombian government program which aimed to increase exporting was trialed experimentally on 200 firms with this goal in mind. Priors were elicited from academics, policymakers, and firms. Contrary to these priors, frequentist estimation can not reject 0 effects in 2019, and finds some negative impacts in 2020. For binary outcomes like whether firms export, frequentist estimates are relatively precise, and Bayesian credible posterior intervals update to overlap almost completely with standard confidence intervals. For outcomes like increasing export variety, where the priors align with the data, the value of these priors is seen in posterior intervals that are considerably narrower than frequentist confidence intervals. Finally, for noisy outcomes like export value, posterior intervals show almost no updating from the priors, highlighting how uninformative the data are about such outcomes
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10274
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  • 6
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    Altered Destinies : The Long-Term Effects of Rising Prices and Food Insecurity in the Middle East and North Africa (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Series Statement: Middle East and North Africa Economic Update
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Keywords: Data Opacity ; Economic Growth ; Forecasting Growth ; Inadequate Data System ; Inflation ; Oil ; Oil Exporters ; Oil Importers ; Oil Prices ; Recovery
    Abstract: Growth is forecasted to slow down for the Middle East and North Africa region. The war in Ukraine in 2022 exacerbated inflationary pressures as the world recovered from the COVID 19 pandemic-induced recession. The response by central banks to raise rates to curb inflation is slowing economic activity, while rising food prices are making it difficult for families to put meals on the table. Inflation, when it stems from food prices, hits the poor harder than the rich. Moreover, food insecurity in MENA has been rising over decades. The immediate effects of food insecurity can be a devastating loss of life, but even temporary increases in food prices can cause long-term irreversible damages, especially to children. The rise in food prices due to the war in Ukraine may have altered the destinies of thousands of children in the region, setting them on paths to limited prosperity. Food insecurity imposes challenges to a region where the state of child nutrition and health were inadequate before the shocks from the COVID-19 pandemic. The report discusses policy options and highlights the need for data to guide effective decision making
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  • 7
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    Balancing Act : Jobs and Wages in the Middle East and North Africa When Crises Hit (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Series Statement: Middle East and North Africa Economic Update
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Keywords: Adjustments ; Covid-19 ; Currency Depreciations ; Growth ; Inflation ; Jobs ; Labor Markets ; MENA ; Middle East ; Middle East and North Africa ; North Africa ; Shocks ; Terms of Trade ; Wages
    Abstract: Covid-19. The Russian invasion of Ukraine. Commodity price volatility. The rise of global inflation and interest rates. Currency depreciations among indebted middle-income economies. And now, natural disasters. As a sequence of events, the consequences can be both tragic and long-lasting. After analyzing the macroeconomic prospects of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region, this edition of the regional Economic Update assesses the human toll of macroeconomic shocks in terms of lost jobs and deteriorating livelihoods of the people of MENA. Growth is forecast to decelerate in 2023 after experiencing an oil-price induced growth spurt in 2022 among the high-income oil exporters of the region. Yet as the region continues to recover from the impact of the COVID-19 shock and navigates the heightened volatility in its terms of trade, the region's labor force is contending with the ramifications for their livelihoods of the inflationary pressures associated with currency fluctuations in some countries. The authors estimate that the macroeconomic shocks of 2020-22 led to an additional 5.1 million individuals becoming unemployed in MENA. Will these shocks permanently scar the hard-working people of MENA? The report answers this question by highlighting the trade-offs facing labor markets when facing macroeconomic shocks. A critical trade-off pertains to the loss of jobs versus decreases in real incomes, neither of which is desirable. The report advocates for maintaining the flexibility of real wages and discusses policy options to support the most vulnerable
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  • 8
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    Is there Still a Role for Direct Government Support to Firms in Developing Countries? (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
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    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (12 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Is there Still a Role for Direct Government Support to Firms in Developing Countries?
    Keywords: Development Economics and Aid Effectiveness ; Firm Support ; Green Growth Agenda ; Impact Evaluation ; Industrial Economics ; Industrial Policy ; Industry ; Macroeconomic Policy ; Macroeconomics and Economic Growth ; Subsidized Loans
    Abstract: Should governments in developing countries directly support firms with policies such as grants, subsidized loans, and training and consulting programs, or should they instead just aim to enact sensible regulatory and macroeconomic policies and not attempt to engage in industrial policy While industrial policy has gained renewed attention in developed economies, it faces considerable skepticism in developing countries scarred by previous experiences and facing limited fiscal space. This paper discusses the rationale for government involvement, and then lessons from a recent research agenda in development economics on how to target these programs, on whether they induce firms to undertake additional activities, on avoiding political capture, and on how these interact with competition. This work shows that these policies can deliver some of their promised benefits, but that there is still much to learn and the need for systematic and serious attempts at prospective impact evaluation as new policies are launched
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10628
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  • 9
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    Migration, Families, and Counterfactual Families (2023)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (53 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Bertoli, Simone Migration, Families, and Counterfactual Families
    Keywords: Counterfactual Reasoning ; Family Formation ; Human Rights ; International Economics and Trade ; International Migration ; Law and Development ; Macroeconomics and Economic Growth ; Migrant Policy ; Migrants Families ; Migration ; Remittances ; Status Quo Bias
    Abstract: Migration changes how families form and dissolve, and how one should conceptualize the family. This has implications for thinking about how the migration decision is modelled when individuals are unable to picture the counterfactual families they may have. Differences in marital status can induce two otherwise identical individuals to make different migration decisions. It also has implications for attempts to causally estimate impacts of migration, when the family composition changes with the migration decision itself. This paper shows empirically that changing marital status after migration is widespread, and that the traditional model of a fixed family sending off a migrant who remains part of that same family only describes a minority of migrants moving from developing countries to the U.S. The authors draw out lessons from thinking about counterfactual families for empirical research and for migration policy
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10626
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  • 10
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    Capacity Building as a Route to Export Market Expansion : A Six-Country Experiment in the Western Balkans (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (33 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Ana P., Cusolito Capacity Building as a Route to Export Market Expansion: A Six-Country Experiment in the Western Balkans
    Keywords: Broadcast and Media ; Consulting ; Customer Acquisition ; Digital Presence ; Export Competitiveness ; Export Market Expansion ; Information and Communication Technologies ; International Economics and Trade ; Marketing Training ; Private Sector Development ; Skills Development and Labor Force Training ; Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) ; Small and Medium Size Enterprises ; Training
    Abstract: The limited market size of many small emerging economies is a key constraint to the growth of innovative small and medium enterprises. Exporting offers a potential solution, but firms may struggle to locate and appeal to foreign buyers. A six-country randomized experiment was conducted with 225 firms in the Western Balkans to test the effectiveness of 30 hours of live group-based training and 5 hours of one-on-one remote consulting in overcoming these constraints. Treated firms used techniques such as search engine optimization and improved Facebook content to increase their digital presence and better reach foreign customers. A year later, positive and significant impacts are found on the number of customers, and a significant intensive margin increase in export sales. Qualitative interviews suggest this improvement came from a combination of sector-specific advice on market expansion, and through an encouragement effect which gave entrepreneurs the confidence to try new sales strategies
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10256
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  • 11
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    Towards a Learning State (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
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    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Keywords: Data Opacity ; Economic Growth ; Forecasting Growth ; Inadequate Data System ; Inflation ; Oil ; Oil Exporters ; Oil Importers ; Oil Prices ; Pandemic ; Recovery
    Abstract: The MENA region is facing important vulnerabilities, which the current crises-first the pandemic, then the war in Ukraine-have exacerbated. Prices of food and energy are higher, hurting the most vulnerable, and rising interest rates from the global tightening of monetary policy are making debt service more burdensome. Part I explores some of the resulting vulnerabilities for MENA. MENA countries are facing diverging paths for future growth. Oil Exporters have seen windfall increases in state revenues from the rise in hydrocarbon prices, while oil importers face heightened stress and risk-from higher import bills, especially for food and energy, and the depreciation of local currencies in some countries. Part II of this report argues that poor governance, and, in particular, the lack of government transparency and accountability, is at the root of the region's development failings-including low growth, exclusion of the most disadvantaged and women, and overuse of such precious natural resources as land and water
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  • 12
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    Field and Natural Experiments in Migration (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
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    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (42 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Field and Natural Experiments in Migration
    Keywords: Difference-In-Differences ; Economic Growth ; Experimental Methods ; Instrumental Variables ; Migration Experiments ; Natural Experiment ; Regression Discontinuity ; Social Protection and Labor
    Abstract: Many research and policy questions surrounding migration are causal questions. What causes people to migrate? What are the consequences of migration for the migrants, their families, and their communities? Answering these questions requires dealing with the self-selection inherent in migration choices. Field and natural experiments offer methodological approaches that enable answering these causal questions. This paper discusses the key conceptual and logistical issues that face applied researchers when applying these methods to the study of migration, as well as providing guidance for practitioners and policymakers in assessing the credibility of causal claims. For randomized experiments, this includes providing a framework for thinking through what can be randomized; discussing key measurement and design issues that arise from issues such as migration being a rare event, and in measuring welfare changes when people change locations; as well as discussing ethical issues that can arise. The paper then outlines what makes for a good natural experiment in the context of migration, and discusses the implications of recent econometric work for the use of difference-indifferences, instrumental variables (and especially shift-share instruments), and regression discontinuity methods in migration research. A key lesson from this recent work is that it is not meaningful to talk about ?the? impact of migration, but rather impacts are likely to be heterogeneous, affecting both the validity and interpretation of causal estimates
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10250
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  • 13
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    Calamities, Debt, and Growth in Developing Countries (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (24 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Yuting Fan, Rachel Calamities, Debt, and Growth in Developing Countries
    Keywords: Coronavirus Economic Recovery ; COVID-19 Recovery ; Debt Financed Public Spending ; Developing Country Debt ; Disaster Recovery ; Economic Impact Of Covid Pandemic ; Economic Recover In Developing Countries ; Finance and Financial Sector Development ; Government Debt ; Pandemic Economic Impact ; Public Debt ; Public Debt Restructuring ; Public Sector Development ; Safety Nets and Transfers ; Social Protection ; Social Protections and Labor
    Abstract: Public debt in developing economies rose at a fast clip during 2020-21, at least partly due to the onset of the global Covid-19 pandemic. Nobel laureate Paul Krugman opined in early 2021 that "fighting covid is like fighting a war." This paper argues that the Covid-19 pandemic shares many traits with natural disasters, except for the global nature of the pandemic shock. This paper empirically examines trends in debt and economic growth around the onset of three types of calamities, namely natural disasters, armed conflicts, and external-debt distress in developing countries. The estimations provide quantitative estimates of differences in growth and debt trends in economies suffering episodes of calamities relative to the trends observed in economies not experiencing calamities. The paper finds that debt and growth evolve quite differently depending on the type of calamity. The evidence indicates that public debt and output growth tend to rise faster after natural disasters than in the counterfactual scenario without disasters, thus illustrating how debt-financed fiscal expansions can help economic reconstruction. The findings are different for episodes of debt distress defined as periods of debt restructuring, however. Economies experiencing debt distress are associated with growth trends that are on average below the growth rates of unaffected economies prior to and after the beginning of an episode of debt restructuring
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10015
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  • 14
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    Reality Check : Forecasting Growth in the Middle East and North Africa in Times of Uncertainty (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Series Statement: Middle East and North Africa Economic Update
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Keywords: Data Opacity ; Economic Growth ; Forecasting Growth ; Inadequate Data System ; Inflation ; Oil ; Oil Exporters ; Oil Importers ; Oil Prices ; Recovery
    Abstract: The Middle East and North Africa economies face an uncertain recovery. The war in Ukraine presents significant challenges to the global economy and the MENA region. Inflationary pressures brought about by the pandemic are likely to be further exacerbated by the conflict. The potential for rising food prices is even higher, which is likely to hurt the wallets of the poor and vulnerable in the region. The COVID-19 pandemic continues to cast a shadow. As the latest variant sweeps over the region, countries grapple with a host of problems depending on initial conditions and policy priorities. The region, like the rest of the world, is not out of the woods yet. Vaccinations remain the effective path out of the pandemic, leading to lower hospitalizations and death rates. Testing helps curb the spread. During times of uncertainty, it is important to not be overconfident about the region's growth prospects. Growth forecasts serve as a significant signpost for policymakers to chart a path forward. Over the last decade, growth forecasts in the MENA region have often been inaccurate and overly optimistic, which can lead to economic contractions down the road due to ebullient borrowing. There is considerable room for the region to improve its forecasts that are largely hindered by opaque data systems, growth volatility and conflict. The MENA region lags considerably in the timely production of credible statistics. A key finding of the report is that the best way to improve forecasters is to provide forecasters with as much good quality information as possible
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  • 15
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    Fears and Tears : Should More People be Moving within and from Developing Countries, and what Stops this Movement? (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (28 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Fears and Tears: Should More People be Moving within and from Developing Countries, and what Stops this Movement?
    Keywords: Attachment To Home ; Benefits of Urbanization ; Communities and Human Settlements ; Constraints That Limit Movement ; Economics of Migration ; Health, Nutrition and Population ; Human Migrations and Resettlements ; Internal Relocation ; International Economics and Trade ; International Migration ; Mental Health ; Migration Policy ; Psychological Uncertainty of Relocation ; Wealth and Wellbeing
    Abstract: Only one in seven of the world's population has ever migrated, despite the enormous gains in income possible through international and internal movement. This paper examines the evidence for different explanations given in the economics literature for this lack of movement and their implications for policy. Incorrect information about the gains to migrating, liquidity constraints that prevent poor people paying the costs of moving, and high costs of movement arising from both physical transportation costs and policy barriers all inhibit movement and offer scope for policy efforts to inform, provide credit, and lower moving costs. However, the economics literature has paid less attention to the fears people have when faced with the uncertainty of moving to a new place, and to the reasons behind the tears they shed when moving. While these tears reveal the attachment people have to particular places, this attachment is not fixed, but itself changes with migration experiences. Psychological factors such as a bias toward the status quo and the inability to picture what one is giving up by not migrating can result in people not moving, even when they would benefit from movement and are not constrained by finances or policy barriers from doing so. This suggests new avenues for policy interventions that can help individuals better visualize the opportunity costs of not moving, alleviate their uncertainties, and help shift their default behavior from not migrating
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-10128
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  • 16
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    The Upside of Digital for the Middle East and North Africa : How Digital Technology Adoption Can Accelerate Growth and Create Jobs (2022)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
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    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (94 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Abstract: The argument that digitalization fosters economic activity has been strengthened by the global COVID-19 pandemic. Because digital technologies are general-purpose technologies that are usable across a wide variety of economic activities, the gains from achieving universal coverage of digital services are likely to be large and shared throughout each economy. However, the Middle East and North Africa region suffers from a "digital paradox": the region's population uses social media more than expected for its level of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita but uses the internet or other digital tools to make payments less than expected. The Upside of Digital for the Middle East and North Africa: How Digital Technology Adoption Can Accelerate Growth and Create Jobs presents evidence that the socioeconomic gains of digitalizing the economies of the region are huge: GDP per capita could rise by more than 40 percent; manufacturing revenue per unit of factors of production could increase by 37 percent; employment in manufacturing could rise by 7 percent; tourist arrivals could rise by 70 percent, creating jobs in the hospitality sector; long-term unemployment rates could fall to negligible levels; and female labor force participation could double to more than 40 percent. To reap these gains, universal access to digital services is crucial, as is their widespread use for economic purposes. The book explores how fast the region could approach universal coverage, whether targeting the rollout of digital infrastructure services makes a difference, and what is needed to increase the use of digital payment tools. The authors find that targeting underserved populations and areas can accelerate the achievement of universal access, while fostering competition and improving the functioning of financial and telecommunications sectors can encourage the adoption of digital technologies. In addition, building societal trust in the government and in related institutions such as banks and financial services is critical for fostering the increased use of digital payment tools
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  • 17
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    How has COVID-19 Affected the Intention to Migrate via the Backway to Europe and to a Neighboring African Country? : Survey Evidence and a Salience Experiment in the Gambia (2021)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (34 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Print Version: Bah, Tijan L How has COVID-19 Affected the Intention to Migrate via the Backway to Europe and to a Neighboring African Country? Survey Evidence and a Salience Experiment in the Gambia
    Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in border closures in many countries and a sharp reduction in overall international mobility. However, this disruption of legal pathways to migration has raised concerns that potential migrants may turn to irregular migration routes as a substitute. This paper examines how the pandemic has changed intentions to migrate from The Gambia, the country with the highest pre-pandemic per-capita irregular migration rates in Africa. A large-scale panel survey conducted in 2019 and 2020 is used to compare changes in intentions to migrate to Europe and to neighboring Senegal. The data show that the pandemic has reduced the intention to migrate to both destinations, with approximately one-third of young males expressing less intention to migrate. The largest reductions in migration intentions are for individuals who were unsure of their intent pre-pandemic, and for poorer individuals who are no longer able to afford the costs of migrating at a time when these costs have increased and their remittance income has fallen. This paper also introduces the methodology of priming experiments to the study of migration intentions, by randomly varying the salience of the COVID-19 pandemic before eliciting intentions to migrate. There is no impact of this added salience, which appears to be because knowledge of the virus, while imperfect, was already enough to inform migration decisions. Nevertheless, despite these decreases in intentions, the overall desire to migrate the backway to Europe remains high, highlighting the need for legal migration pathways to support migrants and divert them from the risks of backway migration
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-9658
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  • 18
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    Testing Classic Theories of Migration in the Lab (2021)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (49 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Print Version: Batista, Catia Testing Classic Theories of Migration in the Lab
    Keywords: Destination Choice ; Employment and Unemployment ; International Economics and Trade ; International Migration ; Lab Experiment ; Migrant Selection ; Poverty Reduction ; Social Protections and Labor ; Wages, Compensation and Benefits
    Abstract: The predictions of different classic migration theories are tested by using incentivized laboratory experiments to investigate how potential migrants decide between working in different destinations. First, the authors test theories of income maximization, migrant skill-selection, and multi-destination choice as they vary migration costs, liquidity constraints, risk, social benefits, and incomplete information. The standard income maximization model of migration with selection on observed and unobserved skills leads to a much higher migration rate and more negative skill-selection than is obtained when migration decisions take place under more realistic assumptions. Second, these lab experiments are used to investigate whether the independence of irrelevant alternatives assumption holds. The results show that it holds for most people when decisions just involve wages, costs, and liquidity constraints. However, once the risk of unemployment and incomplete information is added, independence of irrelevant alternatives no longer holds for about 20 percent of the sample
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-9751
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  • 19
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    What Prevents More Small Firms from Using Professional Business Services? : An Information and Quality-Rating Experiment in Nigeria (2021)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (31 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Print Version: Anderson, Stephen J What Prevents More Small Firms from Using Professional Business Services? An Information and Quality-Rating Experiment in Nigeria
    Abstract: Why do more small firms in developing countries not use the market for professional business services like accounting, marketing, and human resource specialists? Two key reasons may be that firms lack information about the availability of these services, and that they struggle to distinguish the quality of good versus bad providers. A brand recognition exercise finds that most small firms are unaware of most providers in this market, and a survey of service providers reveals that they largely rely on word-of-mouth and informal reputation mechanisms for acquiring customers. This study set up a business services marketplace that contains information about the different providers present in the market and used mystery shopper visits to develop a quality ratings system. A randomized experiment with more than 1,000 firms provided access to this marketplace to the treatment group and randomized whether firms received just information or also quality ratings. The provision of quality ratings information shifts small firms' preferences over which provider they would like to use, increasing the average quality rating of their preferred providers by 0.2 to 0.4 ratings points out of 5. However, neither the provision of information nor these quality ratings had any significant impact on the likelihood that small firms go on to hire a business service provider over the subsequent six months. The results suggest that alleviating information frictions alone is insufficient to increase usage of professional business services
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-9614
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  • 20
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    Aspirations and Financial Decisions : Experimental Evidence from the Philippines (2021)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (40 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Print Version: McKenzie, David Aspirations and Financial Decisions: Experimental Evidence from the Philippines
    Abstract: A randomized experiment among poor entrepreneurs tested the impact of exogenously inducing higher financial aspirations. In theory, raising aspirations could have positive effects by inducing higher effort, but could also reduce effort if unmet aspirations lead to frustration. Treatment resulted in more ambitious savings goals, but nearly all individuals fell far short of reaching these goals. Two years later, treated individuals had not saved more, and actually had lower borrowing and business investments. Treatment also reduced belief in the amount of control over one's life. Setting aspirations too high can lead to frustration, leading individuals to reduce their economic investments
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-9586
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  • 21
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    Overconfident : How Economic and Health Fault Lines Left the Middle East and North Africa Ill-Prepared to Face COVID (2021)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Series Statement: Middle East and North Africa Economic Update
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Keywords: Current Account ; Economic Growth ; External Balances ; Fiscal Balance ; Oil ; Oil and Gas ; Oil Exporters ; Oil Importers ; Oil Prices ; Productivity
    Abstract: Overconfident: How Economic and Health Fault Lines Left the Middle East and North Africa Ill-Prepared to Face COVID This report examines the region's economic prospects in 2021, forecasting that the recovery will be both tenuous and uneven as per capita GDP level stays below pre-pandemic levels. COVID-19 was a stress-test for the region's public health systems, which were already overwhelmed even before the pandemic. Indeed, a decade of lackluster economic reforms left a legacy of large public sectors and high public debt that effectively crowded out investments in social services such as public health. This edition points out that the region's health systems were not only ill-prepared for the pandemic, but suffered from over-confidence, as authorities painted an overly optimistic picture in self-assessments of health system preparedness. Going forward, governments must improve data transparency for public health and undertake reforms to remedy historical underinvestment in public health systems
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-1798-4
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  • 22
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    Mena Economic Update April 2021 : How Institutions Shape the Tradeoff between Short-Term Needs and Long-Term Costs of Public Debt in Middle East and North Africa (2021)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Abstract: Part I of this report discusses the short- and medium-term growth prospects for countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The region is expected to grow at a subdued rate of 0.6 percent in 2019, rising to 2.6 percent in 2020 and 2.9 percent in 2021. The growth forecast for 2019 is revised down by 0.8 percentage points from the April 2019 projection. MENA's economic outlook is subject to substantial downside risks-most notably, intensified global economic headwinds and rising geopolitical tensions. Part II argues that promoting fair competition is key for MENA countries to complete the transition from an administered to a market economy. Part II first examines current competition policies in MENA countries and to promote fair competition calls for strengthening competition law and enforcement agencies. It also calls for corporatizing state-owned enterprises, promoting the private sector and creating a level-playing field between them. Any moves to reform MENA economies would be aided by professional management of public assets, which could tap into a new source of national wealth
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-1699-4
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  • 23
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    Middle East and North Africa Economic Update, April 2020 : How Transparency Can Help the Middle East and North Africa (2020)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 pages)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Series Statement: Middle East and North Africa Economic Update
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Abstract: Part I of this report discusses the short- and medium-term growth prospects for countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The region is expected to grow at a subdued rate of 0.6 percent in 2019, rising to 2.6 percent in 2020 and 2.9 percent in 2021. The growth forecast for 2019 is revised down by 0.8 percentage points from the April 2019 projection. MENA's economic outlook is subject to substantial downside risks-most notably, intensified global economic headwinds and rising geopolitical tensions. Part II argues that promoting fair competition is key for MENA countries to complete the transition from an administered to a market economy. Part II first examines current competition policies in MENA countries and to promote fair competition calls for strengthening competition law and enforcement agencies. It also calls for corporatizing state-owned enterprises, promoting the private sector and creating a level-playing field between them. Any moves to reform MENA economies would be aided by professional management of public assets, which could tap into a new source of national wealth
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-1561-4
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  • 24
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    The Effects of Digital-Technology Adoption on Productivity and Factor Demand : Firm-Level Evidence from Developing Countries (2020)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (48 pages)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Ana Paula, Ana Paula The Effects of Digital-Technology Adoption on Productivity and Factor Demand: Firm-Level Evidence from Developing Countries
    Abstract: This paper presents firm-level estimates of revenue-based total factor productivity premiums of manufacturing firms adopting digital technology in 82 developing economies over 2002-19. The paper estimates productivity using the control function approach and assuming an endogenous revenue-based total factor productivity process, which is a function of multiple firm-choice variables. It estimates the effects of digital technology adoption, learning by exporting, and managerial experience on revenue-based total factor productivity and factor demand. The results reject the 0 hypothesis of an exogenous revenue-based total factor productivity process, in favor of one in which digital technology adoption, along with the other choice variables, affects revenue-based total factor productivity and factor demand. The estimated premiums are positive for 67.3 (email adoption), 54.6 (website adoption), 59.4 (learning by exporting), and 60.6 (managerial experience) percent of the sample. The probability-adjusted median (log) revenue-based total factor productivity premium associated with email adoption is 1.6 percent and that of website adoption is 2.2 percent, with the latter being higher than the premiums corresponding to exporting and managerial experience. On average, changes in digital technology adoption, email, and website are labor and capital augmenting. The paper also explores the role of complementarities among the firm choice variables
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-9333
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  • 25
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    Better Neighbors : Toward a Renewal of Economic Integration in Latin America (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    ISBN: 9781464809781
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (1 online resource (196 p.))
    Edition: Online-Ausg.
    Series Statement: Latin America and Caribbean Studies
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Druckausg.
    Keywords: Labor Market Integration ; Regional Integration ; Trade Integration ; Economic Integration ; Stability
    Abstract: This book proposes a renewal of 'Open Regionalism' in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) aimed at achieving the region's goals of high growth with stability. The LAC region experienced a growth spurt with equity during the first decade of the 21st Century. It is well understood that an unsustainable demand boom fueled by terms-of-trade improvements drove this growth acceleration episode, especially in South America. Unfortunately, terms of trade are no longer fueling growth, and the region's policymakers are in search of new sources of growth with stability. With the experience of East Asia and the Pacific in mind, many policymakers in LAC are looking to international economic ties as a potential source of stable growth. The challenge highlighted in this book lies in designing an integration agenda comprising trade and factor market integration that is conducive to region-wide efficiency gains, which can help LAC enhance its global competitiveness. The forces of geography imply that pro-growth global integration cannot be achieved without building a strong neighborhood. Thus, this volume argues that LAC's regional economic integration agenda needs to go well beyond the current spaghetti bowl of preferential trading arrangements
    Note: Description based on print version record
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-0977-4
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  • 26
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    Growing Markets through Business Training for Female Entrepreneurs : A Market-Level Randomized Experiment in Kenya (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (55 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Growing Markets through Business Training for Female Entrepreneurs: A Market-Level Randomized Experiment in Kenya
    Abstract: A common concern with efforts to directly help some small businesses to grow is that their growth comes at the expense of their unassisted competitors. This study tests this possibility using a two-stage randomized experiment in Kenya. The experiment randomizes business training at the market level, and then within markets to selected businesses. Three years after training, the treated businesses are selling more, earn higher profits, and their owners have higher well-being. There is no evidence of negative spillovers on the competing businesses, and the markets as a whole appear to have grown in terms of number of customers and sales volumes. This market growth appears to come from enhanced customer service and new product introduction, generating more customers and more sales from existing customers. As a result, business growth in underdeveloped markets is possible without taking sales away from nontreated businesses
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7993
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  • 27
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    Open and Nimble : Finding Stable Growth in Small Economies (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    ISBN: 9781464810435
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (132 p)
    Series Statement: Directions in Development
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Abstract: Does economic size matter for economic development outcomes? If so are current policies adequately addressing the role of size in the development process? Using working age population as a proxy for country size, Open and Nimble, systematically analyzes what makes small economies unique. Small economies are not necessarily prone to underdevelopment and in fact can achieve very high income levels. Small economies, however, do tend to be highly open to both international trade and foreign direct investment, have highly specialized export structures, and have large government expenditures relative to their Gross Domestic Product. The export structures of small economies are concentrated in a few products or services and in a small number of export destinations. In turn, this export concentration is associated with terms of trade volatility, which combined with high exposure to international trade, implies that small economies tend to face more volatility on average as external volatility permeates national economic life. Yet small economies tend to compensate for their export concentration by being nimble in the sense of being able to change their production and export structure relatively quickly over time. Moreover, limited territory plays a role in shaping how economies are affected by natural disasters, even when the probability of facing such disasters is not necessarily higher among small than among large economies. The combination of large governments with macroeconomic volatility seems to be associated with low national savings rates in small economies. This combination could be a challenge for long-term growth if productivity growth and foreign investment do not compensate for low domestic savings. The book finishes with some thoughts on how policy makers can respond to these issues through coordinated investments and regional integration efforts, as well as fiscal policy reforms aimed at both increasing public savings and conducting countercyclical fiscal policies
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-1042-8
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  • 28
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    How Effective Are Active Labor Market Policies in Developing Countries? A Critical Review of Recent Evidence (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (32 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David How Effective Are Active Labor Market Policies in Developing Countries? A Critical Review of Recent Evidence
    Abstract: Jobs are the number one policy concern of policy makers in many countries. The global financial crisis, rising demographic pressures, high unemployment rates, and concerns over automation all make it seem imperative that policy makers employ increasingly more active labor market policies. This paper critically examines recent evaluations of labor market policies that have provided vocational training, wage subsidies, job search assistance, and assistance moving to argue that many active labor market policies are much less effective than policymakers typically assume. Many of these evaluations find no significant impacts on either employment or earnings. One reason is that urban labor markets appear to work reasonably well in many cases, with fewer market failures than is often thought. As a result, there is less of a role for many traditional active labor market policies than is common practice. The review then discusses examples of job creation policies that do seem to offer promise, and concludes with lessons for impact evaluation and policy is this area
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-8011
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  • 29
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    Learning the Impact of Financial Education When Take-Up Is Low (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (38 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Ibarra, Gabriel Lara Learning the Impact of Financial Education When Take-Up Is Low
    Abstract: Financial education programs are increasingly offered by governments, nonprofits, and financial institutions. However, voluntary participation rates in such programs are often very low, posing a severe challenge for randomized experiments attempting to measure their impact. This study uses a large experiment on more than 100,000 credit card clients in Mexico. The study shows how the richness of financial data allows combining nonexperimental methods with the experiment to yield credible measures of impact, even with take-up rates below 1 percent. The findings show that a financial education workshop and personalized coaching result in a higher likelihood of paying credit cards on time, and of making more than the minimum payment, but do not reduce spending, resulting in higher profitability for the bank
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-8238
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  • 30
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    The Rise of the Middle Class and Economic Growth in ASEAN (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (26 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Brueckner, Markus The Rise of the Middle Class and Economic Growth in ASEAN
    Abstract: This paper presents estimates of the relationship between the share of income accruing to the middle class and gross domestic product per capita of economies from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. The increase in gross domestic product per capita that these economies experienced during 1970-2010 significantly contributed to a higher share of income accruing to the middle class. The impact of the rise of the middle class on economic growth depends on the countries' initial level of gross domestic product per capita. In the majority of these countries, a rise of the middle class that is unrelated to gross domestic product per capita growth would have had a significant negative effect on economic growth, based on the values of the countries' gross domestic product per capita in 1970. In contrast, for recent values of gross domestic product per capita, a rise of the middle class would positively contribute to growth in gross domestic product per capita. The paper shows that human capital accumulation is an important channel through which a rise of the middle class affects economic growth
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-8068
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  • 31
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    Leaning Against the Wind : Fiscal Policy in Latin America and the Caribbean in a Historical Perspective (2017)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource
    Series Statement: Latin America and Caribbean Semiannual Report
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Abstract: This report by the Office of the Chief Economist for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) of the World Bank studies the region's fiscal policies. After reviewing LAC's growth performance, Chapter 1 provides an accounting of its financing needs during the 21st Century to understand how such a diverse region ended up with fiscal deficits across the board in 2016. Chapter 2 goes back to the 1960s and assesses the cyclical properties of fiscal policies. LAC, like most developing countries and in contrast with most developed economies, exhibited procyclical fiscal policies. Good news arrived in the 2000s: one in three economies became countercyclical, which helped improve credit ratings. Yet fiscal policy is complicated by our inability to know if current economic conditions are temporary or permanent. The report argues for a prudent stance that would err on the side of saving too much during upswings and perhaps borrowing too little during downturns
    DOI: 10.1596/26364
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  • 32
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    Economic Integration across Latin America : Evidence from Labor Markets, 1990-2013 (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (39 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Lederman, Daniel Economic Integration across Latin America: Evidence from Labor Markets, 1990-2013
    Abstract: Combining macroeconomic and microeconomic data and three indicators of international market integration, this paper assesses the degree to which Latin American labor markets are integrated. The results suggest that relative to East Asia, Latin American labor markets are somewhat more integrated, but considerable differences across countries persist. In addition, the evidence indicates that the degree of labor market integration across Latin American borders is significantly less than that of labor markets within Mexico and within the United States in two of the three indicators. These differences may suggest opportunities for efficiency gains from further labor market integration
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7847
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  • 33
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    Faraway or Nearby? Domestic and International Spillovers in Patenting and Product Innovation (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (36 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Bravo-Ortega, Claudio Faraway or Nearby? Domestic and International Spillovers in Patenting and Product Innovation
    Abstract: The diffusion of knowledge plays a central role in endogenous growth theories. Simply put, in these models new knowledge can be generated from preexisting knowledge. In other words, existing knowledge is a pure public good, which can benefit any economic agent anywhere. More generally, endogenous growth theories rely on a broad set of assumptions that have not been tested sufficiently, especially for developing economies. The scope and nature of knowledge spillovers is, however, important for policy, because the presumed positive spillovers can justify government intervention (if the spillovers are localized) or laissez faire (if the spillovers are international). This paper empirically assesses the scope and direction of knowledge spillovers in national patenting and, separately, product innovation by firms. The first set of exercises tests whether the cumulative knowledge specifications of the knowledge production function can explain international patterns of patenting or whether own research and development is necessary to produce patents. The second set of exercises analyzes whether firm product-quality upgrading and the introduction of new products depend on product innovation within industries, within or across countries. The evidence supports the view that existing stocks of knowledge, domestic and foreign, enhance national innovation and entrepreneurship in the form of product innovation. More specifically, the evidence suggests that within-country and international knowledge spillovers are positive, but international spillovers can be negative for firms that are far from innovative firms in terms of productivity. The results depend on the concept of "distance" between countries and firms
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7828
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  • 34
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    Can Enhancing the Benefits of Formalization Induce Informal Firms to Become Formal? Experimental Evidence from Benin (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (60 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Benhassine, Najy Can Enhancing the Benefits of Formalization Induce Informal Firms to Become Formal? Experimental Evidence from Benin
    Abstract: Governments around the world have introduced reforms to attempt to make it easier for informal firms to formalize. However, most informal firms have not gone on to become formal, especially when tax registration is involved. A randomized experiment based around the introduction of the entreprenant legal status in Benin is used to provide evidence from an African context on the willingness of informal firms to register after introducing a simple, free registration process, and to test the effectiveness of supplementary efforts to enhance the presumed benefits of formalization by facilitating its links to government training programs, support to open bank accounts, and tax mediation services. Few firms register when just given information about the new regime, but 9.6 percentage points more register when they were visited in person and the benefits were explained. The full package of supplementary efforts boosts the impact on the formalization rate to 16.3 percentage points, demonstrating that enhancing the benefits of formalization does induce more firms to formalize. Firms that are larger, and that look more like formal firms to begin with, are more likely to formalize, providing guidance for better targeting of such policies. However, formalization appears to offer limited benefits to the firms, and the costs of personalized assistance are high, suggesting that such enhanced formalization efforts are unlikely to pass cost-benefit tests
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7900
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  • 35
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    Exporters, Engineers, and Blue-Collar Workers (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (16 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Brambilla, Irene Exporters, Engineers, and Blue-Collar Workers
    Abstract: This paper investigates differences in the composition of employment between exporting and non-exporting firms. In particular, it asks whether exporting firms hire more engineers relative to blue-collar workers than non-exporting firms. In a stylized partial-equilibrium model, firms produce goods of varying quality and exporters tend to produce higher quality goods, which are intensive in engineers relative to blue-collar workers. Firms are heterogeneous and more productive firms become exporters and have a higher demand for engineers. The paper provides causal evidence in support of these theories using the Chilean Encuesta Nacional Industrial Anual, an annual census of manufacturing firms. The results from an instrumental variable estimator suggest that Chilean exporters indeed utilize a higher share of engineers over blue-collar workers
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7686
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  • 36
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    Can Business Owners Form Accurate Counterfactuals? : Eliciting Treatment and Control Beliefs about Their Outcomes in the Alternative Treatment Status (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (24 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Can Business Owners Form Accurate Counterfactuals? : Eliciting Treatment and Control Beliefs about Their Outcomes in the Alternative Treatment Status
    Abstract: A survey of participants in a large-scale business plan competition experiment, in which winners received an average of US
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7668
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  • 37
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    The Price is Not Always Right : On the Impacts of Commodity Prices on Households (and Countries) (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (50 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Lederman, Daniel The Price is Not Always Right : On the Impacts of Commodity Prices on Households (and Countries)
    Abstract: This paper provides an overview of the impact that one-time changes in commodity and other prices have on household welfare. It begins with a collection of stylized facts related to commodities based on household survey data from Latin America and Africa. The ata uncovers strong commodity dependence on both continents: households typically allocate a large fraction of their budget to commodities, and they often also depend on commodities to earn their income. This income and expenditure dependency suggests sizable impacts and adjustments following commodity price shocks. The article explores these effects with a review of the relevant literature. The authors study consumption and income responses, labor market responses, and spillovers across sectors. The paper provides evidence on the relative magnitudes of various mechanisms through which commodity prices affect household (and national) welfare in developing economies
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7583
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  • 38
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    Factor Endowments, Technology, Capital Mobility and the Sources of Comparative Advantage in Manufacturing (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (31 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Hakobyan, Shushanik Factor Endowments, Technology, Capital Mobility and the Sources of Comparative Advantage in Manufacturing
    Abstract: Using data on net exports and factor endowments for more than 100 countries, this paper studies the relationship between factor endowments and comparative advantage in 28 manufacturing sectors between 1975 and 2010. The authors allow for systematic technological differences across countries, including differences in factor intensities across countries with different ratios of skilled labor over unskilled labor. Capital seems to be a source of comparative disadvantage in manufacturing, and skilled labor is a source of comparative advantage in the global sample. However, skilled labor is a source of comparative disadvantage in economies with low human capital, whereas it is a source of comparative advantage in the sample of countries with high human capital. The authors attribute this heterogeneity to the rise of capital mobility across countries, particularly since the mid-1990s
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7777
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  • 39
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    The Volatility of International Trade Flows in the 21st Century : Whose Fault Is It Anyway? (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (50 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Bennett, Federico The Volatility of International Trade Flows in the 21st Century: Whose Fault Is It Anyway?
    Abstract: After investment, exports and imports are the most volatile components of aggregate demand within countries. Moreover, the volatility of growth and the volatility of trade flows tend to move together; they declined from the 1990s until 2009, followed by an increase since 2009. This paper explores the drivers of such movements in trade-flow volatility. The analysis decomposes trade growth into six components to study their contribution to the overall volatility of trade flows, and presents three findings. First, trade volatility is mostly explained by a factor common to all countries, country-specific factors, and changes in the gravity-related characteristics of a country's trading partners. Product composition and the identity of trading partners appear to be less important in explaining volatility. Second, the pre-2009 decline in volatility and the post-2009 increase in volatility appear to be driven by different factors. The former is mostly explained by a steady decline in the variance of country-specific factors. In contrast, the latter appears to be driven mainly by an increase in the volatility of factors common to all countries. Third, trade diversification is a likely force behind the steady decline in trade volatility driven by country-specific factors, especially in developing countries
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7781
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  • 40
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    The Big Switch in Latin America : Restoring Growth through Trade (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource
    Series Statement: Latin America and Caribbean Semiannual Report
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Abstract: This report, produced by the Office of the Chief Economist for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) of the World Bank, examines LAC's challenges as the global economy settles to an equilibrium with lower growth and lower commodity prices. Chapter 1 gives an overview of the world economy and how it affects LAC's short and medium-term prospects. It argues that LAC suffered an external shock that shaped growth in recent years, and that the current global context is likely here to stay. Many LAC countries experienced significant depreciations which in principle should help adjust to the new equilibrium. The extent to which these depreciations facilitate a soft landing, however, depends on a number of factors. Chapter 2 explores the response of LAC's trade to the recent depreciations and the role it could play in facilitating a recovery. It examines if there are early signs of an export recovery and whether the region's increased dependence on commodity exports could hinder LAC's recovery
    DOI: 10.1596/25098
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  • 41
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    Labor Drops : Experimental Evidence on the Return to Additional Labor in Microenterprises (2016)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (60 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als de Mel, Suresh Labor Drops: Experimental Evidence on the Return to Additional Labor in Microenterprises
    Abstract: The majority of enterprises in many developing countries have no paid workers. This paper reports on a field experiment conducted in Sri Lanka that provided wage subsidies to randomly chosen microenterprises to test whether hiring additional labor would benefit such firms. In the presence of labor market frictions, a short-term subsidy could have a lasting impact on firm employment. Using 12 rounds of surveys to track dynamics four years after the end of the subsidy, the study finds that firms increased employment during the subsidy period, but there was no lasting impact on employment, profitability, or sales. Two supplementary interventions and treatment heterogeneity suggest the lack of impact is not due to complementarities with capital or management skills, and detailed survey data help rule out a number of theoretical mechanisms that could result in sub-optimally low employment. The study concludes that the urban labor market facing microenterprises does not have large frictions that would prevent own-account workers from becoming employers
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7924
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  • 42
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    America Latina y el ascenso del Sur : Nuevas prioridades en un mundo cambiante (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    ISBN: 9781464803567
    Language: Spanish
    Pages: Online-Ressource (1 online resource (256 p.))
    Edition: Online-Ausg.
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Druckausg.
    Keywords: Spanish translation ; FDI ; Foreign direct investment ; Domestic savings ; Financial integration
    Abstract: Este reporte explora la restructuracion de la economia global ocasionada por el ascenso del Sur y destaca la transformacion en los patrones de integracion global de ALC y las consecuencias de esta transformacion en la dinamica del desarrollo de la region. En particular, se analiza de forma sistematica los aspectos concernientes al comercio y las finanzas internacionales, la macroeconomia y el mercado laboral latinoamericano
    Note: Description based on print version record
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-0431-1
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  • 43
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    Business Practices in Small Firms in Developing Countries (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (42 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Business Practices in Small Firms in Developing Countries
    Abstract: Management has a large effect on the productivity of large firms. But does management matter in micro and small firms, where the majority of the labor force in developing countries works? This study developed 26 questions that measure business practices in marketing, stock-keeping, record-keeping, and financial planning. These questions have been administered in surveys in Bangladesh, Chile, Ghana, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, and Sri Lanka. This paper shows that variation in business practices explains as much of the variation in outcomes-sales, profits, and labor productivity and total factor productivity-in microenterprises as in larger enterprises. Panel data from three countries indicate that better business practices predict higher survival rates and faster sales growth. The effect of business practices is robust to including many measures of the owner's human capital. The analysis finds that owners with higher human capital, children of entrepreneurs, and firms with employees employ better business practices. Competition has less robust effects
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7405
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  • 44
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    Identifying and Spurring High-Growth Entrepreneurship : Experimental Evidence from a Business Plan Competition (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (74 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David Identifying and Spurring High-Growth Entrepreneurship: Experimental Evidence from a Business Plan Competition
    Abstract: Almost all firms in developing countries have fewer than 10 workers, with the modal firm consisting of just the owner. Are there potential high-growth entrepreneurs with the ability to grow their firms beyond this size? And, if so, can public policy help alleviate the constraints that prevent these entrepreneurs from doing so? A large-scale national business plan competition in Nigeria is used to help provide evidence on these two questions. The competition was launched with much fanfare, and attracted almost 24,000 entrants. Random assignment was used to select some of the winners from a pool of semi-finalists, with US
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7391
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 45
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    Effects of Income Inequality on Aggregate Output (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (34 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Brueckner, Markus Effects of Income Inequality on Aggregate Output
    Abstract: Macroeconomics and Economic Growth
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7317
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  • 46
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    Finding a Path to Formalization in Benin : Early Results after the Introduction of the Entreprenant Legal Status (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (39 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Benhassine, Najy Finding a Path to Formalization in Benin: Early Results after the Introduction of the Entreprenant Legal Status
    Abstract: In April 2014, the Government of Benin launched the entreprenant status, a simplified and free legal regime offered to small informal businesses to enter the formal economy. This paper presents the short-term results of a randomized impact evaluation testing three different versions of the entreprenant status on business registration decisions, each version including incremental incentives to registration: (i) information on the new legal status and its benefits, (ii) business training, counseling services, and support to open a bank account, (iii) tax mediation services. The study included 3,600 informal businesses operating with a fixed location in Cotonou, Benin, which were randomly allocated between three treatment groups and one control group. One year after the program launch, all versions of the program had significant impact on formalization rates. The impact was 9.1 percentage points in the first treatment group; 13 percentage points in the second group; and 15.8 percentage points in the last group. The program had a higher impact on male business owners, with more education, operating outside Dantokpa Market, in sectors other than trade, and that before being offered the incentives to formalization had characteristics similar to businesses that were already formal. Data from a second follow-up survey, which is expected to take place in March 2016, will explore the impacts on other outcomes, like business performances or access to banking
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7510
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 47
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    The Long-Term Impacts of International Migration : Evidence from a Lottery (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (35 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Gibson, John The Long-Term Impacts of International Migration: Evidence from a Lottery
    Abstract: This study examines the long-term impacts of international migration by comparing immigrants who had successful ballot entries in a migration lottery program, and first moved almost a decade ago, with people who had unsuccessful entries into those same ballots. The long-term gain in income is found to be similar in magnitude to the gain in the first year, despite migrants upgrading their education and changing their locations and occupations. This results in large, sustained benefits to the migrants' immediate family, who have substantially higher consumption, durable asset ownership, savings, and dietary diversity. In contrast, the study finds no measureable impact on extended family
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7495
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 48
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    Tracking Wage Inequality Trends with Prices and Different Trade Models : Evidence from Mexico (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (42 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Halliday, Timothy Tracking Wage Inequality Trends with Prices and Different Trade Models: Evidence from Mexico
    Abstract: Mexican wage inequality rose following Mexicos accession to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade/World Trade Organization in 1986. Since the mid-1990s, however, wage inequality has been falling. Since most trade models suggest that output prices can affect factor prices, this paper explores the relationship between output prices and wage inequality. The rise of inequality can be explained by the evolution of the relative price of skill-intensive goods relative to unskilled-intensive goods, but these prices flattened by 1999 and thus cannot explain the subsequent decline in wage inequality. An alternative trade model with firm heterogeneity driven by variations in the relative price of tradable relative to non-tradable goods can explain the decline in wage inequality. The paper compares this model's predictions with Mexican inequality statistics using data on output prices, census data, and quarterly household survey data. In spite of the models simplicity, the model's predictions match Mexican variables reasonably well during the years when wage inequality fell
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7471
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 49
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    The Demand for, and Impact of, Youth Internships : Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Yemen (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (22 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David The Demand for, and Impact of, Youth Internships: Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Yemen
    Abstract: This paper evaluates a youth internship program in the Republic of Yemen that provided firms with a 50 percent subsidy to hire recent graduates of universities and vocational schools. The first round of the program took place in 2014 and required both firms and youth to apply for the program. The paper examines the demand for such a program, and finds that in the context of an economy facing substantial political and economic uncertainty, it appears there is an oversupply of graduates in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, and a relative undersupply of graduates in marketing and business. Conditional on the types of graduates firms were looking to hire as interns, applicants were then randomly chosen for the program. Receiving an internship resulted in an almost doubling of work experience in 2014, and a 73 percent increase in income during this period compared with the control group. A short-term follow-up survey conducted just as civil conflict was breaking out shows that internship recipients had better employment outcomes than the control group in the first five months after the program ended
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7463
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 50
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    The Additionality Impact of a Matching Grant Program for Small Firms : Experimental Evidence from Yemen (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (23 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als McKenzie, David The Additionality Impact of a Matching Grant Program for Small Firms: Experimental Evidence from Yemen
    Abstract: Matching grants are one of the most common types of private sector development programs used in developing countries. But government subsidies to private firms can be controversial. A key question is that of additionality: do these programs get firms to undertake innovative activities that they would not otherwise do, or merely subsidize activities that would take place anyway? Randomized controlled trials can provide the counterfactual needed to answer this question, but efforts to experiment with matching grant programs have often failed. This paper uses a randomized controlled trial of a matching grant program for firms in the Republic of Yemen to demonstrate the feasibility of conducting experiments with well-designed programs, and to measure the additionality impact. In the first year, the matching grant is found to have led to more product innovation, firms upgrading their accounting systems, marketing more, making more capital investments, and being more likely to report their sales grew
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7462
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 51
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    Export Promotion and Firm Entry into and Survival in Export Markets (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (26 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Lederman, Daniel Export Promotion and Firm Entry into and Survival in Export Markets
    Abstract: Surveys of export promotion agencies suggest that that they tend to focus on helping firms become exporters as a means to stimulate aggregate export growth. But the existing empirical evidence has paid little attention to the role of export promotion agencies in helping entry into exporting. This paper fills this gap with a panel of exporting and non-exporting firms from seven Latin American countries during the period 2006-2010. The results suggest that export promotion encourages exports mainly by helping firms enter into and survive in export markets. The impact on the intensive margin of exporting firms is not robust. This finding is consistent with export promotion helping reduce fixed rather than variable costs of exporting, which is to be expected if export promotion agencies help correct for market failures associated with information externalities
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7400
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 52
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    Latent Trade Diversification and its Relevance for Macroeconomic Stability (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (54 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Lederman, Daniel Latent Trade Diversification and its Relevance for Macroeconomic Stability
    Abstract: Poverty Reduction
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7332
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  • 53
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    Short-Term Impacts of Formalization Assistance and a Bank Information Session on Business Registration and Access to Finance in Malawi (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (43 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Campos, Francisco Short-Term Impacts of Formalization Assistance and a Bank Information Session on Business Registration and Access to Finance in Malawi
    Abstract: Despite regulatory efforts designed to make it easier for firms to formalize, informality remains extremely high among firms in Sub-Saharan Africa. In most of the region, business registration in a national registry is separate from tax registration. This paper provides initial results from an experiment in Malawi that randomly allocated firms into a control group and three treatment groups: a) a group offered assistance for costless business registration; b) a group offered assistance with costless business registration and (separate) tax registration; and c) a group offered assistance for costless business registration along with an information session at a bank that ended with the offer of business bank accounts. The study finds that all three treatments had extremely large impacts on business registration, with 75 percent of those offered assistance receiving a business registration certificate. The findings offer a cost-effective way of getting firms to formalize in this dimension. However, in common with other studies, information and assistance has a limited impact on tax registration. The paper measures the short-term impacts of formalization on financial access and usage. Business registration alone has no impact for either men or women on bank account usage, savings, or credit. However, the combination of formalization assistance and the bank information session results in significant impacts on having a business bank account, financial practices, savings, and use of complementary financial products
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7183
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  • 54
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    Latin America and the Rising South : Changing World, Changing Priorities (2015)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    ISBN: 9781464803567
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (1 online resource (248 p.))
    Edition: Online-Ausg.
    Series Statement: Latin America and Caribbean Studies
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Druckausg. Latin America and the rising South
    DDC: 332.098
    RVK:
    QG 630
    Keywords: Entwicklung ; Wirtschaftswachstum ; Wirtschaftslage ; Lateinamerika ; Karibischer Raum ; Wirtschaftliche Integration ; Weltwirtschaft ; Sozioökonomischer Wandel ; Süden ; Emerging Market ; Wirtschaftswachstum ; Außenhandel ; Finanzwirtschaft ; Investition ; domestic savings ; FDI ; Financial integration ; Foreign direct investment ; Global financial network ; Global trade network ; Global value chains ; Globalization ; International Economics and Trade ; Labor market dynamics ; Macroeconomics and Economic Growth ; Private Sector Development ; Real exchange rate dynamics ; Rise of the south ; Trade Integration ; Trade structure ; Erde ; Lateinamerika
    Abstract: The world economy is not what it used to be twenty years ago. For most of the 20th century, the world economy was characterized by developed (North) countries acting as 'center' to a 'periphery' of developing (South) countries. However, the recent rise of developing economies suggests the need to go beyond this North-South dichotomy. This tectonic re-configuration of the global landscape has brought about significant changes to countries in the Latin America and Caribean (LAC) region. The time is ripe for an in-depth analysis of the dynamics and nature of LAC's external connections.This latest volume in the World Bank Latin American and Caribbean Studies series will focus on the implications of these trends for the economic development of LAC countries. In particular, trade, financial, macroeconomic, and sectoral shifts, as well as labor-market aspects will be systematically analyzed
    Note: Description based on print version record
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-0355-0
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  • 55
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    The Impact of Vocational Training for the Unemployed : Experimental Evidence from Turkey (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (45 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Hirshleifer, Sarojini The Impact of Vocational Training for the Unemployed
    Keywords: Arbeitsmarktpolitik ; Berufsbildung ; Erwerbstätigkeit ; Wirkungsanalyse ; Türkei
    Abstract: A randomized experiment is used to evaluate a large-scale, active labor market policy: Turkey's vocational training programs for the unemployed. A detailed follow-up survey of a large sample with low attrition enables precise estimation of treatment impacts and their heterogeneity. The average impact of training on employment is positive, but close to zero and statistically insignificant, which is much lower than either program officials or applicants expected. Over the first year after training, the paper finds that training had statistically significant effects on the quality of employment and that the positive impacts are stronger when training is offered by private providers. However, longer-term administrative data show that after three years these effects have also dissipated
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6807
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  • 56
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    Do Poverty Traps Exist? (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (27 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Kraay, Aart Do Poverty Traps Exist?
    Abstract: This paper reviews the empirical evidence on the existence of poverty traps, understood as self-reinforcing mechanisms through which poor individuals or countries remain poor. Poverty traps have captured the interest of many development policy makers, because poverty traps provide a theoretically coherent explanation for persistent poverty. They also suggest that temporary policy interventions may have long-term effects on poverty. However, a review of the reduced-form empirical evidence suggests that truly stagnant incomes of the sort predicted by standard models of poverty traps are in fact quite rare. Moreover, the empirical evidence regarding several canonical mechanisms underlying models of poverty traps is mixed
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6835
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  • 57
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    Why Don't Remittances Appear to Affect Growth? (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (51 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Clemens, Michael A Why Don't Remittances Appear to Affect Growth?
    Abstract: Although measured remittances by migrant workers have soared in recent years, macroeconomic studies have difficulty detecting their effect on economic growth. This paper reviews existing explanations for this puzzle and proposes three new ones. First, it offers evidence that a large majority of the recent rise in measured remittances may be illusory-arising from changes in measurement, not changes in real financial flows. Second, it shows that even if these increases were correctly measured, cross-country regressions would have too little power to detect their effects on growth. Third, it points out that the greatest driver of rising remittances is rising migration, which has an opportunity cost to economic product at the origin. Net of that cost, there is little reason to expect large growth effects of remittances in the origin economy. Migration and remittances clearly have first-order effects on poverty at the origin, on the welfare of migrants and their families, and on global gross domestic product; but detecting their effects on growth of the origin economy is likely to remain elusive
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6856
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  • 58
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    The Price is Not Always Right : On the Impacts of (Commodity) Prices on Households (and Countries) (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (41 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Lederman, Daniel The Price is Not Always Right
    Abstract: This paper provides an overview of the impact of once-and-for-all changes in commodity prices and other prices on household welfare. It begins with a collection of stylized facts related to commodities based on household survey data from Latin America and Africa. The data uncover strong commodity dependence in both continents: households typically allocate a large fraction of their budget to commodities and they often depend on commodities to earn their income. This income and expenditure dependency suggests sizable impacts and adjustments following commodity-price shocks. The paper explores these effects with a review of the literature. It studies consumption and income responses, labor-market responses, and spillovers across sectors. It ends up providing evidence on the relative magnitudes of various mechanisms through which commodity prices affect household (and national) welfare in developing economies
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6858
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  • 59
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    Directing Remittances to Education with Soft and Hard Commitments : Evidence from a Lab-in-the-Field Experiment and New Product Take-up among Filipino Migrants in Rome (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (26 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: De Arcangelis, Giuseppe Directing Remittances to Education with Soft and Hard Commitments
    Abstract: This paper tests how migrants' willingness to remit changes when given the ability to direct remittances to educational purposes using different forms of commitment. Variants of a dictator game in a lab-in-the-field experiment with Filipino migrants in Rome are used to examine remitting behavior under varying degrees of commitment. These range from the soft commitment of simply labeling remittances as being for education, to the hard commitment of having funds directly paid to a school and the student's educational performance monitored. The analysis finds that the introduction of simple labeling for education raises remittances by more than 15 percent. Adding the ability to directly send this funding to the school adds only a further 2.2 percent. The information asymmetry between migrants and their most closely connected household is randomly varied, but no significant change is found in the remittance response to these forms of commitment as information varies. Behavior in these games is shown to be predictive of take-up of a new financial product called EduPay, designed to allow migrants to pay remittances directly to schools in the Philippines. This take-up seems largely driven by a response to the ability to label remittances for education, rather than to the hard commitment feature of directly paying schools
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6896
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  • 60
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    El Emprendimiento en America Latina : Muchas empresas y poca innovacion (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    ISBN: 9781464802850
    Language: Spanish
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (178 p)
    Series Statement: Latin American Development Forum
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als
    Abstract: El emprendimiento es un determinante fundamental del crecimiento y la creacion de empleo. Pese a que los emprendedores abundan en America Latina y el Caribe, las empresas de la region son mas pequenas y menos propensas a crecer e innovar que las de otras regiones. El crecimiento de la productividad lleva decadas siendo mediocre y el reciente period de auge de las materias primas no ha supuesto una excepcion. Asi pues, la presencia de emprendedores dinamicos sera necesaria para impulsar la creacion de puestos de trabajo de calidad y la aceleracion del crecimiento de la productividad en la region. En El emprendimiento en America Latina: muchas empresas y poca innovacion se estudia el panorama del emprendimiento en America Latina y el Caribe. El libro recurre a nuevas bases de datos que abordan cuestiones como la creacion de empresas, las dinamicas empresariales, las decisiones de exportar y el comportamiento de las corporaciones multinacionales y sintetiza los resultados de un analisis exhaustivo del estatus, las perspectivas y los retos del emprendimiento en la region. Asimismo, el libro suministra herramientas utiles e informacion para ayudar a los profesionales y responsables de las politicas a identificar los ambitos de las mismas que los gobiernos pueden explorar para impulsar la innovacion e incentivar el emprendimiento transformador con potencial de crecimiento elevado
    DOI: 10.1596/978-1-4648-0284-3
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  • 61
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    Testing the Importance of Search Frictions, Matching, and Reservation Prestige through Randomized Experiments in Jordan (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (43 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Groh, Matthew Testing the Importance of Search Frictions, Matching, and Reservation Prestige through Randomized Experiments in Jordan
    Abstract: Unemployment rates for tertiary-educated youth in Jordan are high, as is the duration of unemployment. Two randomized experiments in Jordan were used to test different theories that may explain this phenomenon. The first experiment tested the role of search and matching frictions by providing firms and job candidates with an intensive screening and matching service based on educational backgrounds and psychometric assessments. Although more than 1,000 matches were made, youth rejected the opportunity to even have an interview in 28 percent of cases, and when a job offer was received, they rejected this offer or quickly quit the job 83 percent of the time. A second experiment built on the first by examining the willingness of educated, unemployed youth to apply for jobs of varying levels of prestige. Youth applied to only a small proportion of the job openings they were told about, with application rates higher for higher prestige jobs than lower prestige jobs. Youth failed to show up for the majority of interviews scheduled for low prestige jobs. The results suggest that reservation prestige is an important factor underlying the unemployment of educated Jordanian youth
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7030
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  • 62
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    Radio Frequency (Un)Identification : Results from a Proof-of-Concept Trial of the Use of RFID Technology to Measure Microenterprise Turnover in Sri Lanka (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (44 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: de Mel, Suresh Radio Frequency (Un)Identification
    Keywords: Kleinstunternehmen ; Befragung ; Gewinn ; Absatz ; RFID
    Abstract: Accurate measurement of stock levels, turnover, and profitability in microenterprises in developing countries is difficult because the majority of these firms do not keep detailed records. This paper tests the use of radio frequency identification tags as a means of objectively measuring stock levels and stock flow in small retail firms in Sri Lanka. In principle, the tags offer the potential to track stock movements accurately. The paper compares the stock counts obtained from RFID reads to physical stock counts and to survey responses. There are three main findings. First, current RFID-technology is more difficult to use, and more time-consuming to employ, than had been envisaged. Second, the technology works reasonably well for paper products, but very poorly for most products sold by microenterprises: on average only about one-quarter of the products tagged could be read and there was considerable day-to-day variation in read-efficiency. Third, a comparison of survey responses and physical stock-takes shows much higher accuracy for survey measures. As a result, the study concludes that this technology is currently unsuitable for improving stock measurement in microenterprises, except perhaps for a few products
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  • 63
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    Development through Seasonal Worker Programs : The Case of New Zealand's RSE Program (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (30 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Gibson, John Development through Seasonal Worker Programs
    Abstract: Seasonal worker programs are increasingly seen as offering the potential to be part of international development policy. New Zealand's Recognised Seasonal Employer program is one of the first and most prominent of programs designed with this perspective. This paper provides a detailed examination of this policy through the first six seasons. This includes the important role of policy facilitation measures taken by governments and aid agencies. The evolution of the program in terms of worker numbers is discussed, along with new data on the (high) degree of circularity in worker movements, and new data on (very low) worker overstay rates. There appears to have been little displacement of New Zealand workers, and new data show Recognised Seasonal Employer workers to be more productive than local labor and that workers appear to gain productivity as they return for subsequent seasons. The program has also benefitted the migrants participating in the program, with increases in per capita incomes, expenditure, savings, and subjective well-being. Taken together, this evidence suggests that the program is largely living up to its promise of a "triple win" for migrants, their sending countries in the Pacific, and New Zealand
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6762
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  • 64
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    Macroinsurance for Microenterprises : A Randomized Experiment in Post-Revolution Egypt (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (38 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Groh, Matthew Macroinsurance for Microenterprises
    Abstract: Firms in many developing countries cite macroeconomic instability and political uncertainty as major constraints to their growth. Economic theory suggests uncertainty can cause firms to delay investments until uncertainty is resolved. A randomized experiment was conducted in post-revolution Egypt to measure the impact of insuring microenterprises against macroeconomic and political uncertainty. Demand for macroeconomic shock insurance was high; 36.7 percent of microentrepreneurs in the treatment group purchased insurance. However, purchasing insurance does not change the likelihood that a business takes a new loan, the size of the loan, or how the loan is invested. This lack of effect is attributed to microenterprises largely investing in inventories and raw materials rather than irreversible investments like equipment. These results suggest that, contrary to what some firms profess, macroeconomic and political risk is not inhibiting the investment behavior of microenterprises. However, insurance may still be of value to help firms cope with shocks when they do occur, but the paper is unable to examine this dimension, because the insurance product did not pay out over the course of the pilot
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  • 65
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    Evidence on Policies to Increase the Development Impacts of International Migration (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (52 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: McKenzie, David Evidence on Policies to Increase the Development Impacts of International Migration
    Abstract: International migration offers individuals and their families the potential to experience immediate and large gains in their incomes, and offers a large number of other positive benefits to the sending communities and countries. However, there are also concerns about potential costs of migration, including concerns about trafficking and human rights, a desire for remittances to be used more effectively, and concerns about externalities from skilled workers being lost. As a result there is increasing interest in policies which can enhance the development benefits of international migration and mitigate these potential costs. This paper provides a critical review of recent research on the effectiveness of these policies at three stages of the migration process: pre-departure, during migration, and directed toward possible return. The existing evidence base suggests some areas of policy success: bilateral migration agreements for countries whose workers have few other migration options, developing new savings and remittance products that allow migrants more control over how their money is used, and some efforts to provide financial education to migrants and their families. Suggestive evidence together with theory offers support for a number of other policies, such as lowering the cost of remittances, reducing passport costs, offering dual citizenship, and removing exit barriers to migration. Research offers reasons to be cautious about some policies, such as enforcing strong rights for migrants like high minimum wages. Nevertheless, the paper finds the evidence base to be weak for many policies, with no reliable research on the impact of most return migration programs, nor for whether countries should be trying to induce communal remitting through matching funds
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  • 66
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    Structural Reforms and Labor Market Outcomes : International Panel Data Evidence (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (42 p)
    Edition: 2014 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Hollweg, Claire H Structural Reforms and Labor Market Outcomes
    Abstract: This paper explores the impact of structural reforms on a comprehensive set of macro-level labor-market outcomes, including the unemployment rate, the average wage index, and overall and female employment levels and labor force participation rates. Together these outcome variables capture the overall health of the labor market and the aggregate welfare of workers. Yet, there seems to be no other comprehensive empirical investigation in the existing literature of the impact of structural reforms at the cross-country macro level on labor-market outcomes other than the unemployment rate. Data were collected from a variety of sources, including the World Bank World Development Indicators, the International Monetary Fund International Financial Statistics, and the International Labor Organization Key Indicators of the Labor Market. The resulting dataset covers up to 88 countries, the majority being developing, for 10 years on either side of structural reforms that took place between 1960 and 2001. After documenting the average trends across countries in the labor-market outcomes up to 10 years on either side of each country's structural reform year, the authors run fixed-effects ordinary least squares as well as instrumental variables regressions to account for the likely endogeneity of structural reforms to labor-market outcomes. Overall the results suggest that structural reforms lead to positive outcomes for labor. Unlike related literature, the paper does not find conclusive evidence on unemployment. Redistributive effects in favor of workers, along the lines of the Stolper-Samuelson effect, may be at work
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7122
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  • 67
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    Export Shocks and the Volatility of Returns to Schooling : Evidence from Twelve Latin American Economies (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (30 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Lederman, Daniel Export Shocks and the Volatility of Returns to Schooling: Evidence from Twelve Latin American Economies
    Abstract: This paper builds on previous studies to uncover evidence suggesting that cyclical fluctuations in returns to schooling are determined by fluctuations in foreign demand, which tend to be positively correlated with returns to schooling. The effec
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7144
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  • 68
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    The Rise of China and Labor Market Adjustments in Latin America (2014)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: 1 Online-Ressource (58 p)
    Series Statement: World Bank E-Library Archive
    Parallel Title: Erscheint auch als Artuç, Erhan The Rise of China and Labor Market Adjustments in Latin America
    Abstract: This paper assesses the impact of the rise of China on the trade of Latin American and Caribbean economies. The study proposes an index to measure the impact on trade, which suggests sizable effects, especially in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Hondu
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-7155
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  • 69
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    Export Entrepreneurship and Trade Structure in Latin America during Good and Bad Times (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (45 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Fernandes, Ana M Export Entrepreneurship and Trade Structure in Latin America during Good and Bad Times
    Abstract: The authors use a new dataset on export transactions for a large set of Latin American and Caribbean and comparator countries to assess the extent of "export entrepreneurship" during periods of fast export growth (2005-2007) and depressed external demand (2008-2009). Export entrepreneurship is equated with the extensive margin of exports, namely the advent of new exporting firms, new export products, and new export market destinations. The main findings are: (1) annual exporter entry, exit, and survival rates in Latin America and the Caribbean are quite similar to what is observed in other countries, and entry rates across sectors are quite similar but survival rates appear to be highest in agriculture; (2) the relative size of entrants into export markets (relative to incumbents) tended to be lower for natural resource-abundant countries during 2005-2007, but less so during the crisis years of 2008-2009; (3) entry rates tend to be lower in sectors in which a country has revealed comparative advantage, however, exit rates and survival rates of new exporters are higher in those sectors; and (4) the low growth of exports during the global recession of 2008-2009 in Latin America and the Caribbean was due to lower growth in exports of incumbent firms' pre-existing products and destinations, while new products and destinations tended to attenuate the recession's effects. Overall, the data suggest that the Latin American and Caribbean region appears to be no less entrepreneurial in terms of the extensive margins of exports than comparator countries
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6413
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  • 70
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    Eliciting Illegal Migration Rates through List Randomization (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (19 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: McKenzie, David Eliciting Illegal Migration Rates through List Randomization
    Abstract: Most migration surveys do not ask about the legal status of migrants due to concerns about the sensitivity of this question. List randomization is a technique that has been used in a number of other social science applications to elicit sensitive information. This paper trials this technique by adding it to surveys conducted in Ethiopia, Mexico, Morocco, and the Philippines. It shows how, in principal, this can be used both to give an estimate of the overall rate of illegal migration in the population being surveyed, as well as to determine illegal migration rates for subgroups such as more or less educated households. The results suggest that there is some useful information in this method: higher rates of illegal migration in countries where illegal migration is thought to be more prevalent and households who say they have a migrant are more likely to report having an illegal migrant. Nevertheless, some of the other findings also suggest some possible inconsistencies or noise in the conclusions obtained using this method. The authors suggest directions for future attempts to implement this approach in migration surveys
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6426
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  • 71
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    A Helping Hand or the Long Arm of the Law? : Experimental Evidence on What Governments Can Do to Formalize Firms (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (43 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: De Andrade, Gustavo Henrique A Helping Hand or the Long Arm of the Law?
    Abstract: Many governments have spent much of the past decade trying to extend a helping hand to informal businesses by making it easier and cheaper for them to formalize. Much less effort has been devoted to raising the costs of remaining informal, through increasing enforcement of existing regulations. This paper reports on a field experiment conducted in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, in order to test which government actions work in getting informal firms to register. Firms were randomized to a control group or one of four treatment groups: the first received information about how to formalize; the second received this information and free registration costs along with the use of an accountant for a year; the third group was assigned to receive an enforcement visit from a municipal inspector; while the fourth group was assigned to have a neighboring firm receive an enforcement visit to see if enforcement has spillovers. The analysis finds zero or negative impacts of information and free cost treatments, and a significant but small increase in formalization from inspections. Estimates of the impact of actually receiving an inspection give a 21 to 27 percentage point increase in the likelihood of formalizing. The results show most informal firms will not formalize unless forced to do so, suggesting formality offers little private benefit to them. But the tax revenue benefits to the government of bringing firms of this size into the formal system more than offset the costs of inspections
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6435
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  • 72
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    Unilateral Facilitation Does Not Raise International Labor Migration from the Philippines (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (52 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Beam, Emily Unilateral Facilitation Does Not Raise International Labor Migration from the Philippines
    Keywords: 2010-2012 ; Arbeitsmigranten ; Migrationspolitik ; Arbeitsvermittlung ; Wirkungsanalyse ; Schätzung ; Philippinen
    Abstract: Significant income gains from migrating from poorer to richer countries have motivated unilateral (source-country) policies facilitating labor emigration. However, their effectiveness is unknown. The authors conducted a large-scale randomized experiment in the Philippines testing the impact of unilaterally facilitating international labor migration. The most intensive treatment doubled the rate of job offers but had no identifiable effect on international labor migration. Even the highest overseas job-search rate that was induced (22 percent) falls far short of the share initially expressing interest in migrating (34 percent). The paper concludes that unilateral migration facilitation will at most induce a trickle, not a flood, of additional emigration
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6689
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  • 73
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    A Mapping of Labor Mobility Costs in Developing Countries (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (53 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Artuç, Erhan A Mapping of Labor Mobility Costs in Developing Countries
    Abstract: Estimates of labor mobility costs are needed to assess the responses of employment and wages to trade shocks when factor adjustment is costly. Available methods to estimate those costs rely on panel data, which are seldom available in developing countries. The authors propose a method to estimate mobility costs using readily obtainable data worldwide. The estimator matches the changes in observed sectoral employment allocations with the predicted allocations from a model of costly labor adjustment. This paper estimates a world map of labor mobility costs and uses those estimates to explore the response of labor markets to trade policy
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6556
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  • 74
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    Using Administrative Data to Evaluate Municipal Reforms : An Evaluation of the Impact of Minas Fácil Expresso (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (27 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Bruhn, Miriam Using Administrative Data to Evaluate Municipal Reforms
    Abstract: Efforts to make it easier for firms to register formally are the most common form of business regulatory reform over the past decade. While there is evidence that large reforms have resulted in some increases in registration rates, recent experimental evidence suggests very few informal firms choose to register when given information about how to do so. This raises the question of whether it is productive for governments to continue to extend simplification efforts to all firms, especially those in more remote areas where many of the benefits of registering may be reduced. This study uses administrative data to evaluate the impact of Minas Fácil Expresso, a program in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, which attempted to expand a business start-up simplification program to more remote municipalities. Using difference-in-differences with 56 months of registration data for 822 municipalities, the analysis finds introducing these units actually led to a reduction in registration rates, and no change in tax revenues. The paper uses this evaluation to illustrate the design choices and issues involved in using administrative data to evaluate reforms, with the goal of also providing a template that can be used for evaluating similar reforms elsewhere
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6368
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  • 75
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    Why is Voluntary Financial Education so Unpopular? : Experimental Evidence from Mexico (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (46 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Bruhn, Miriam Why is Voluntary Financial Education so Unpopular?
    Abstract: Take-up of voluntary financial education programs is typically extremely low. This paper reports on randomized experiments around a large financial literacy course offered in Mexico City to understand the reasons for low take-up, and to measure the impact of financial education. It documents that the general public displays little interest in such courses and that participation is low even among individuals who express interest in financial education. The paper experimentally investigates barriers to take-up, and finds no impact of relaxing reputational or logistical constraints and no evidence that time inconsistency is the reason for limited participation. Even relatively sizeable monetary incentives get less than 40 percent of interested individuals invited to training to attend. Using a randomized encouragement design, the authors measure the impact of the course on financial knowledge and behavior. Attending training results in a 9 percentage point increase in financial knowledge and a 9 percentage point increase in saving outcomes, but no impact on borrowing behavior. Administrative data indicate that the savings impact is relatively short-lived. The results suggest people are making optimal choices not to attend financial education courses, and point to the limits of using general purpose courses to improve financial behavior for the general population
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6439
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  • 76
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    Entry Regulation and Formalization of Microenterprises in Developing Countries (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (18 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Bruhn, Miriam Entry Regulation and Formalization of Microenterprises in Developing Countries
    Abstract: The majority of microenterprises in most developing countries remain informal despite more than a decade of reforms aimed at making it easier and cheaper for them to formalize. This paper summarizes the evidence on the effects of entry reforms and related policy actions to promote firm formalization. Most of these policies result only in a modest increase in the number of formal firms, if at all. Less is known about the impact of other forms of business regulations on the performance of low-scale enterprises. Most informal firms appear not to benefit on net from formalizing, so ease of formalization alone will not lead to most of them formalizing. Increased enforcement of rules can increase formality. Although there is a fiscal benefit of doing this with larger informal firms, it is unclear whether there is a public rationale for trying to formalize subsistence enterprises
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6507
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  • 77
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    Trade, Informal Employment and Labor Adjustment Costs (2013)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (36 p)
    Edition: 2013 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Arias, Javier Trade, Informal Employment and Labor Adjustment Costs
    Abstract: Informal employment is ubiquitous in developing countries, but few studies have estimated workers' switching costs between informal and formal employment. This paper builds on the empirical literature grounded in discrete choice models to estimate these costs. The results suggest that inter-industry labor mobility costs are large, but entry costs into informal employment are significantly lower than the costs of entry in formal employment. Simulations of labor-market adjustments caused by a trade-related fall in manufacturing goods prices indicate that the share of informally employed workers rises after liberalization, but this is due to entry into the labor market by previously idle labor
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6614
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  • 78
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    The Demand for, and Consequences of, Formalization among Informal Firms in Sri Lanka (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (37 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: De Mel, Suresh The Demand for, and Consequences of, Formalization among Informal Firms in Sri Lanka
    Abstract: The majority of firms in most developing countries are informal. The authors of this paper conducted a field experiment in Sri Lanka that provided incentives for informal firms to formalize. Offering only information about the registration process and reimbursement for direct registration costs had no impact on formalization. Adding payments equivalent to one-half to one month's profits for the median firm led to registration of around one-fifth of firms. A larger payment equivalent to two months' median profits induced half the firms to register. The main reasons for not formalizing when offered incentives included issues related to ownership of land and concerns about facing labor taxes in the future. The degree of bureaucracy in the registration process also seems to matter for those with the incentive to register, with response to the incentives higher in Colombo, where the registration process was easier, than in Kandy. Three follow-up surveys, at 15 to 31 months after the intervention, measure the impact of formalizing on these firms. Although mean profits increased, this appears largely due to the experiences of a few firms that grew rapidly, with most firms experiencing no increase in income as a result of formalizing. The authors also find little evidence for most of the channels through which formalization is hypothesized to benefit firms, although formalized firms do advertise more and are more likely to use receipt books. In qualitative interviews owners of formalized firms also feel their businesses have more legitimacy. Finally, formalizing is found to result in a large increase in trust in the state. Their focus is largely on the private costs and benefits of existing firms formalizing. Within their sample they cannot measure broader impacts of formalization on other firms (who may prosper from not having to compete against informal firms not paying taxes), nor impacts of easier formalization on entry of new firms. Nevertheless, our results suggest that although most informal firms do not want to formalize, given the current private costs and benefits of formalizing, policy efforts that lead to relatively modest increases in the net benefits of formalizing would induce a sizeable share of informal firms to formalize
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5991
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  • 79
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    Trade Causes Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (38 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Brückner, Markus Trade Causes Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa
    Abstract: In the 1990s the mainstream consensus was that trade causes growth. Subsequent research shed doubt on the consensus view, as evidence suggested that the identification of the effect of trade on growth was problematic in the existing literature. This paper contributes to this debate by focusing on growth in Sub-Saharan Africa. It estimates the effect of openness to international trade on economic growth with panel data. Employing instrumental variables techniques that correct for endogeneity bias, the empirical evidence suggests that within-country variations in trade openness cause economic growth: a 1 percentage point increase in the ratio of trade over gross domestic product is associated with a short-run increase in growth of approximately 0.5 percent per year; the long-run effect is larger, reaching about 0.8 percent after ten years. These results are robust to controlling for country and time fixed effects as well as political institutions
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6007
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  • 80
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    Distortions in the International Migrant Labor Market : Evidence from Filipino Migration and Wage Responses to Destination Country Economic Shocks (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (36 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: David McKenzie Distortions in the International Migrant Labor Market
    Abstract: The authors use an original panel dataset of migrant departures from the Philippines to identify the responsiveness of migrant numbers and wages to gross domestic product shocks in destination countries. They find a large significant elasticity of migrant numbers to gross domestic product shocks at destination, but no significant wage response. This is consistent with binding minimum wages for migrant labor. This result implies that labor market imperfections that make international migration attractive also make migrant flows more sensitive to global business cycles. Difference-in-differences analysis of a minimum wage change for maids confirms that minimum wages bind and demand is price sensitive without these distortions
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6041
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  • 81
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    Soft Skills or Hard Cash? : The Impact of Training and Wage Subsidy Programs on Female Youth Employment in Jordan (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (38 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Groh, Matthew Soft Skills or Hard Cash?
    Abstract: Throughout the Middle East, unemployment rates of educated youth have been persistently high and female labor force participation, low. This paper studies the impact of a randomized experiment in Jordan designed to assist female community college graduates find employment. One randomly chosen group of graduates was given a voucher that would pay an employer a subsidy equivalent to the minimum wage for up to 6 months if they hired the graduate; a second group was invited to attend 45 hours of employability skills training designed to provide them with the soft skills employers say graduates often lack; a third group was offered both interventions; and the fourth group forms the control group. The analysis finds that the job voucher led to a 40 percentage point increase in employment in the short-run, but that most of this employment is not formal, and that the average effect is much smaller and no longer statistically significant 4 months after the voucher period has ended. The voucher does appear to have persistent impacts outside the capital, where it almost doubles the employment rate of graduates, but this appears likely to largely reflect displacement effects. Soft-skills training has no average impact on employment, although again there is a weakly significant impact outside the capital. The authors elicit the expectations of academics and development professionals to demonstrate that these findings are novel and unexpected. The results suggest that wage subsidies can help increase employment in the short term, but are not a panacea for the problems of high urban female youth unemployment
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6141
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  • 82
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    Business Training and Female Enterprise Start-up, Growth, and Dynamics : Experimental Evidence from Sri Lanka (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (42 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: De Mel, Suresh Business Training and Female Enterprise Start-up, Growth, and Dynamics
    Abstract: The authors conduct a randomized experiment among women in urban Sri Lanka to measure the impact of the most commonly used business training course in developing countries, the Start-and-Improve Your Business program. They work with two representative groups of women: a random sample of women operating subsistence enterprises and a random sample of women who are out of the labor force but interested in starting a business. They track the impacts of two treatments - training only and training plus a cash grant - over two years with four follow-up surveys and find that the short and medium-term impacts differ. For women already in business, training alone leads to some changes in business practices but has no impact on business profits, sales or capital stock. In contrast, the combination of training and a grant leads to large and significant improvements in business profitability in the first eight months, but this impact dissipates in the second year. For women interested in starting enterprises, business training speeds up entry but leads to no increase in net business ownership by the final survey round. Both profitability and business practices of the new entrants are increased by training, suggesting training may be more effective for new owners than for existing businesses. The study also finds that the two treatments have selection effects, leading to entrants being less analytically skilled and poorer
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6145
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  • 83
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    What are we Learning from Business Training and Entrepreneurship Evaluations around the Developing World? (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (37 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: McKenzie, David What are we Learning from Business Training and Entrepreneurship Evaluations around the Developing World?
    Abstract: Business training programs are a popular policy option to try to improve the performance of enterprises around the world. The last few years have seen rapid growth in the number of evaluations of these programs in developing countries. This paper undertakes a critical review of these studies with the goal of synthesizing the emerging lessons and understanding the limitations of the existing research and the areas in which more work is needed. It finds that there is substantial heterogeneity in the length, content, and types of firms participating in the training programs evaluated. Many evaluations suffer from low statistical power, measure impacts only within a year of training, and experience problems with survey attrition and measurement of firm profits and revenues. Over these short time horizons, there are relatively modest impacts of training on survivorship of existing firms, but stronger evidence that training programs help prospective owners launch new businesses more quickly. Most studies find that existing firm owners implement some of the practices taught in training, but the magnitudes of these improvements in practices are often relatively modest. Few studies find significant impacts on profits or sales, although a couple of the studies with more statistical power have done so. Some studies have also found benefits to microfinance organizations of offering training. To date there is little evidence to help guide policymakers as to whether any impacts found come from trained firms competing away sales from other businesses versus through productivity improvements, and little evidence to guide the development of the provision of training at market prices. The paper concludes by summarizing some directions and key questions for future studies
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6202
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  • 84
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    Monitoring Export Vulnerability to Changes in Growth Rates of Major Global Markets (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (26 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Hollweg, Claire H Monitoring Export Vulnerability to Changes in Growth Rates of Major Global Markets
    Abstract: Interest in assessing the impacts on developing countries of changes in major markets' economic performance has risen in tandem with global economic uncertainty over short- and medium-term growth prospects. This paper proposes a methodology to measure the vulnerability of a country's exports to fluctuations in the economic activity of foreign markets. Export vulnerability depends first on the overall level of export exposure, measured as the share of exports in gross domestic product, and second on the sensitivity of exports to fluctuations in foreign gross domestic product. The authors capture this sensitivity by estimating origin-destination specific elasticities of exports with respect to changes in foreign gross domestic product using a gravity model of trade. Furthermore, export vulnerability is computed separately for commodities and differentiated products. This methodology is applied to six developing countries, one from each World Bank region, selected to be otherwise similar yet differ in terms of the level of exposure to major global markets as well as the product composition of their export basket. Although the results suggest differences in elasticity estimates across regions as well as product categories, the principal source of international heterogeneity in export vulnerability results from differences in export exposure to global markets. This result calls for developing countries to diversify their export markets rather than shielding themselves from international markets, which would actually raise economic risk and vulnerability
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6266
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  • 85
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    What Drives Short-Run Labor Market Volatility in Offshoring Industries? : Evidence from Northern Mexico during 2007-2009 (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (54 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Kaplan David S What Drives Short-Run Labor Market Volatility in Offshoring Industries?
    Abstract: Recent research shows that employment in Mexico's offshoring maquiladora industries is twice as volatile as employment in their U.S. industry counterparts. The analyses in this paper use data from Mexico's social security records and U.S. customs between the first quarter of 2007 and the last quarter of 2009 to identify four channels through which economic shocks emanating from the United States were amplified when transmitted into Mexico's offshoring labor market of Northern Mexico. First, employment and imports within industries are complements, which is consistent with imports being used as inputs for the assembly of exportable goods within industries. That is, when imports fell during the crisis, employment in Mexico was reduced rather than protected by the fall of imports. Second, contrary to other studies, employment is more responsive than wages to trade shocks. Third, fluctuations in Mexico-U.S. trade were associated with changes in the composition of employment, with the skill level of workers rising during downturns and falling during upswings. This implies that the correlation between average wages and trade shocks is partly driven by labor-force compositional effects, which may obscure individual-worker wage flexibility. Fourth, trade shocks affecting related industries (industries linked by employment flows affect employment at least as much as own-industry trade shocks, thus amplifying employment volatility through the propagation of shocks across industries within Northern Mexico. Furthermore, the data suggest that the observed fluctuations in U.S.-Mexico trade at the onset of the Great Recession in the U.S. were not associated with pre-existing employment trends in Northern Mexico
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6268
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  • 86
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    Learning from the Experiments That Never Happened : Lessons from Trying to Conduct Randomized Evaluations of Matching Grant Programs in Africa (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (36 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Campos, Francisco Learning from the Experiments That Never Happened
    Abstract: Matching grants are one of the most common policy instruments used by developing country governments to try to foster technological upgrading, innovation, exports, use of business development services and other activities leading to firm growth. However, since they involve subsidizing firms, the risk is that they could crowd out private investment, subsidizing activities that firms were planning to undertake anyway, or lead to pure private gains, rather than generating the public gains that justify government intervention. As a result, rigorous evaluation of the effects of such programs is important. The authors attempted to implement randomized experiments to evaluate the impact of seven matching grant programs offered in six African countries, but in each case were unable to complete an experimental evaluation. One critique of randomized experiments is publication bias, whereby only those experiments with "interesting" results get published. The hope is to mitigate this bias by learning from the experiments that never happened. This paper describes the three main proximate reasons for lack of implementation: continued project delays, politicians not willing to allow random assignment, and low program take-up; and then delves into the underlying causes of these occurring. Political economy, overly stringent eligibility criteria that do not take account of where value-added may be highest, a lack of attention to detail in "last mile" issues, incentives facing project implementation staff, and the way impact evaluations are funded, and all help explain the failure of randomization. Lessons are drawn from these experiences for both the implementation and the possible evaluation of future projects
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6296
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  • 87
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    The Impact of Financial Literacy Training for Migrants (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (31 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: John Gibson The Impact of Financial Literacy Training for Migrants
    Abstract: Remittances are a major source of external finance for many developing countries but the cost of sending remittances remains high for many migration corridors. International efforts to lower costs by facilitating the entry of new financial products and new cost comparison information sources rely heavily on the financial literacy of migrants. This paper presents the results of a randomized experiment designed to measure the impact of providing financial literacy training to migrants. Training appears to increase financial knowledge and information seeking behavior and reduce the risk of switching to costlier remittance products. But it does not change either the frequency or level of remittances
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6073
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  • 88
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    Who You Train Matters : Identifying Complementary Effects of Financial Education on Migrant Households (2012)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (42 p)
    Edition: 2012 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Doi, Yoko Who You Train Matters?
    Abstract: There has long been a concern among policymakers that too much of remittances are consumed and too little saved, limiting the development impact of migration. Financial literacy programs have become an increasingly popular way to try and address this issue, but to date there is no evidence that they are effective in inducing savings among remittance-receiving households, nor is it clear whether such programs are best targeted at the migrant, the remittance receiver, or both. The authors conducted a randomized experiment in Indonesia which allocated migrants and their families to a control group, a migrant-only training group, a family member-only training group, and a training group in which both the migrant and a family member were trained. Three rounds of follow-up surveys are then used to measure impacts on the financial knowledge, behaviors, and remittance and savings outcomes of the remaining household. They find that training both the migrant and the family member together has large and significant impacts on knowledge, behaviors, and savings. Training the family member alone has some positive, but smaller effects, whilst training only the migrant leads to no impacts on the remaining family members. The results show that financial education can have large effects when provided at a teachable moment, but that this impact varies greatly with who receives training
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-6157
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  • 89
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    Large devaluations, foreign direct investment and exports : A speculative note (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (20 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Lederman, Daniel Large devaluations, foreign direct investment and exports
    Abstract: One side-effect of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008-09 was the resurgence of a debate over exchange rates. The conventional wisdom dictates that real-exchange rate adjustments are needed in order to bring about changes in trade balances across countries. However, the literature on the effect of exchange rate fluctuations and currency under-valuations on exports is surprisingly ambiguous. This note explores for the first time the potential role of foreign direct investment as an intermediate variable in the process of trade adjustment after large real-exchange rate changes. Real-exchange rate devaluations might result in increases in foreign direct investment inflows, as investors can take advantage of changes in the foreign-currency value of domestic assets. If so, the response of exports will depend to some extent on the nature of such foreign direct investment inflows, with inflows motivated by "horizontal" foreign direct investment associated with negligible changes in export growth after devaluation. The author utilizes quarterly data on real effective exchange rates, foreign direct investment inflows and exports to explore the effects of large devaluations (defined as the largest observed quarterly real effective exchange rate devaluation) on foreign direct investment and exports from 1990 to 2010. The admittedly speculative evidence suggests that there were heterogeneous experiences regarding the timing and magnitude of subsequent changes in foreign direct investment and exports, but on average foreign direct investment inflows tended to precede export surges within two year horizons
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5619
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  • 90
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    Beyond Baseline and Follow-up : The Case for More T in Experiments (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (36 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: McKenzie, David Beyond Baseline and Follow-up
    Abstract: The vast majority of randomized experiments in economics rely on a single baseline and single follow-up survey. If multiple follow-ups are conducted, the reason is typically to examine the trajectory of impact effects, so that in effect only one follow-up round is being used to estimate each treatment effect of interest. While such a design is suitable for study of highly autocorrelated and relatively precisely measured outcomes in the health and education domains, this paper makes the case that it is unlikely to be optimal for measuring noisy and relatively less autocorrelated outcomes such as business profits, household incomes and expenditures, and episodic health outcomes. Taking multiple measurements of such outcomes at relatively short intervals allows the researcher to average out noise, increasing power. When the outcomes have low autocorrelation, it can make sense to do no baseline at all. Moreover, the author shows how for such outcomes, more power can be achieved with multiple follow-ups than allocating the same total sample size over a single follow-up and baseline. The analysis highlights the large gains in power from ANCOVA rather than difference-in-differences when autocorrelations are low and a baseline is taken. The paper discusses the issues involved in multiple measurements, and makes recommendations for the design of experiments and related non-experimental impact evaluations
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5639
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  • 91
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    Eight Questions about Brain Drain (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (30 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Gibson, John Eight Questions about Brain Drain
    Abstract: High-skilled emigration is an emotive issue that in popular discourse is often referred to as brain drain, conjuring images of extremely negative impacts on developing countries. Recent discussions of brain gain, diaspora effects, and other advantages of migration have been used to argue against this, but much of the discussion has been absent of evidence. This paper builds upon a new wave of empirical research to answer eight key questions underlying much of the brain drain debate: 1) What is brain drain? 2) Why should economists care about it? 3) Is brain drain increasing? 4) Is there a positive relationship between skilled and unskilled migration? 5) What makes brain drain more likely? 6) Does brain gain exist? 7) Do high-skilled workers remit, invest, and share knowledge back home? And 8) What do we know about the fiscal and production externalities of brain drain?
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5668
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  • 92
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    How Can We Learn Whether Firm Policies are Working in Africa? : Challenges (and Solutions?) for Experiments and Structural Models (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (26 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: McKenzie, David How Can We Learn Whether Firm Policies are Working in Africa?
    Abstract: Firm productivity is low in African countries, prompting governments to try a number of active policies to improve it. Yet despite the millions of dollars spent on these policies, we are far from a situation where we know whether many of them are yielding the desired payoffs. This paper establishes some basic facts about the number and heterogeneity of firms in different sub-Saharan African countries and discusses their implications for experimental and structural approaches towards trying to estimate firm policy impacts. It shows that the typical firm program such as a matching grant scheme or business training program involves only 100 to 300 firms, which are often very heterogeneous in terms of employment and sales levels. As a result, standard experimental designs will lack any power to detect reasonable sized treatment impacts, while structural models which assume common production technologies and few missing markets will be ill-suited to capture the key constraints firms face. Nevertheless, the author suggests a way forward which involves focusing on a more homogeneous sub-sample of firms and collecting a lot more data on them than is typically collected
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5632
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  • 93
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    When is Capital Enough to get Female Enterprises Growing : Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Ghana (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (61 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Fafchamps, Marcel When is Capital Enough to get Female Enterprises Growing
    Abstract: Standard models of investment predict that credit-constrained firms should grow rapidly when given additional capital, and that how this capital is provided should not affect decisions to invest in the business or consume the capital. The authors randomly gave cash and in-kind grants to male- and female-owned microenterprises in urban Ghana. Their findings cast doubt on the ability of capital alone to stimulate the growth of female microenterprises. First, while the average treatment effects of the in-kind grants are large and positive for both males and females, the gain in profits is almost zero for women with initial profits below the median, suggesting that capital alone is not enough to grow subsistence enterprises owned by women. Second, for women they strongly reject equality of the cash and in-kind grants; only in-kind grants lead to growth in business profits. The results for men also suggest a lower impact of cash, but differences between cash and in-kind grants are less robust. The difference in the effects of cash and in-kind grants is associated more with a lack of self-control than with external pressure. As a result, the manner in which funding is provided affects microenterprise growth
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5706
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  • 94
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    International Trade and Inclusive Growth : A Primer for Busy Policy Analysts (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (32 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Lederman, Daniel International Trade and Inclusive Growth
    Abstract: This note provides two analytical frameworks for understanding the role of trade in promoting inclusive growth in developing economies. A working definition of inclusive growth focuses on long-term, sustained growth associated with productivity growth and employment opportunities for broad portions of households and firms within countries. International integration can promote inclusive growth when workers and firms are able to adjust to enter into growing economic activities and adopt technologies availed through international trade. The frameworks described in this note build on simple household and firm choice models, which require only basic knowledge of development economics. The discussion highlights how these frameworks can help analysts focus on research and policy questions related to the impacts of international trade across the distribution of households and firms within countries. It also discusses publicly available data sets that can be used to explore some aspects of inclusive growth. In addition, the note highlights important caveats that need to be acknowledged by analysts and discusses avenues for future research, which needs to be part and parcel of the inclusive growth agenda
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5886
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  • 95
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    The Impact of Economics Blogs (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (47 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: McKenzie, David The Impact of Economics Blogs
    Abstract: There is a proliferation of economics blogs, with increasing numbers of economists attracting large numbers of readers, yet little is known about the impact of this new medium. Using a variety of experimental and non-experimental techniques, this study quantifies some of their effects. First, links from blogs cause a striking increase in the number of abstract views and downloads of economics papers. Second, blogging raises the profile of the blogger (and his or her institution) and boosts their reputation above economists with similar publication records. Finally, a blog can transform attitudes about some of the topics it covers
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5783
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  • 96
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    The Relative Volatility of Commodity Prices : A Reappraisal (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (31 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Arezki, Rabah The Relative Volatility of Commodity Prices
    Abstract: This paper studies the volatility of commodity prices on the basis of a large dataset of monthly prices observed in international trade data from the United States over the period 2002 to 2011. The conventional wisdom in academia and policy circles is that primary commodity prices are more volatile than those of manufactured products, although most of the existing evidence does not actually attempt to measure the volatility of prices of individual goods or commodities. The literature tends to focus on trends in the evolution and volatility of ratios of price indexes composed of multiple commodities and products. This approach can be misleading. Indeed, the evidence presented in this paper suggests that on average prices of individual primary commodities are less volatile than those of individual manufactured goods. However, the challenges of managing terms of trade volatility in developing countries with concentrated export baskets remain
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5903
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  • 97
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    Using Repeated Cross-Sections to Explore Movements into and Out of Poverty (2011)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (44 p)
    Edition: 2011 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Dang, Hai-Anh Using Repeated Cross-Sections to Explore Movements into and Out of Poverty
    Abstract: Movements in and out of poverty are of core interest to both policymakers and economists. Yet the panel data needed to analyze such movements are rare. In this paper, the authors build on the methodology used to construct poverty maps to show how repeated cross-sections of household survey data can allow inferences to be made about movements in and out of poverty. They illustrate that the method permits the estimation of bounds on mobility, and provide non-parametric and parametric approaches to obtaining these bounds. They test how well the method works on data sets for Vietnam and Indonesia where we are able to compare our method to true panel estimates. The results are sufficiently encouraging to offer the prospect of some limited, basic, insights into mobility and poverty duration in settings where historically it was judged that the data necessary for such analysis were unavailable
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5550
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 98
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    Enterprise Recovery Following Natural Disasters (2010)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (44 p)
    Edition: 2010 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Woodruff, Christopher Enterprise Recovery Following Natural Disasters
    Abstract: Using data from surveys of enterprises in Sri Lanka after the December 2004 tsunami, the authors undertake the first microeconomic study of the recovery of the private firms in a developing country following a major natural disaster. Disaster recovery in low-income countries is characterized by the prevalence of relief aid rather than of insurance payments; the data show this distinction has important consequences. The data indicate that aid provided directly to households correlates reasonably well with reported losses of household assets, but is uncorrelated with reported losses of business assets. Business recovery is found to be slower than commonly assumed, with disaster-affected enterprises lagging behind unaffected comparable firms more than three years after the disaster. Using data from random cash grants provided by the project, the paper shows that direct aid is more important in the recovery of enterprises operating in the retail sector than for those operating in the manufacturing and service sectors
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5269
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 99
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    Accounting for Selectivity and Duration-Dependent Heterogeneity When Estimating the Impact of Emigration On Incomes and Poverty in Sending Areas (2010)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (28 p)
    Edition: 2010 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Stillman, Steven Accounting for Selectivity and Duration-Dependent Heterogeneity When Estimating the Impact of Emigration On Incomes and Poverty in Sending Areas
    Abstract: The impacts of international emigration and remittances on incomes and poverty in sending areas are increasingly studied with household survey data. But comparing households with and without emigrants is complicated by a triple-selectivity problem: first, households self-select into emigration; second, in some emigrant households everyone moves while others leave members behind; and third, some emigrants choose to return to the origin country. Allowing for duration-dependent heterogeneity introduces a fourth form of selectivity - one must now worry not just about whether households migrate, but also when they do so. This paper clearly sets out these selectivity issues and their implications for existing migration studies, and then addresses them by using survey data designed specifically to take advantage of a randomized lottery that determines which applicants to the over-subscribed Samoan Quota may immigrate to New Zealand. The analysis compares incomes and poverty rates among left behind members in households in Samoa that sent Samoan Quota emigrants with those for members of similar households that were unsuccessful in the lottery. Policy rules control who can accompany the principal migrant, providing an instrument to address the second selectivity problem, while differences among migrants in which year their ballot was selected allow for estimation of duration effects. The authors find that migration reduced poverty among former household members, but they also find suggestive evidence that this effect may be short-lived as both remittances and agricultural income are negatively related to the duration that the migrant has been abroad
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5268
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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  • 100
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    Microeconomic consequences and macroeconomic causes of foreign direct investment in southern African economies (2010)
    Washington, D.C : The World Bank
    Details
    Language: English
    Pages: Online-Ressource (34 p)
    Edition: 2010 World Bank eLibrary
    Parallel Title: Lederman, Daniel Microeconomic consequences and macroeconomic causes of foreign direct investment in southern African economies
    Abstract: The causes and consequences of foreign direct investment (FDI) in developing countries remains a subject of debate among researchers and policymakers alike. The authors use international data and a new micro-data set of firms in thirteen Southern African Developing Countries (SADCs) to investigate the benefits and determinants of FDI in this region. FDI appears to have facilitated local development in the SADC region. Foreign firms tend to perform better than domestic firms, tend to be larger, are located in richer and better-governed countries and in countries with more competitive financial intermediaries, and they are more likely to export than domestic firms. They also exhibit positive spillover effects to domestic firms. Relying on a standard model to predict the country-level FDI inflows per capita, the authors find that SADC is attracting their expected level of FDI inflows, at least relative to its income level, human capital, demographic structure, institutions, and economic track record. There are some differences between SADC and the rest of the world in FDI behavior: in SADC, the income level is less important and openness more so. The authors use two comparison groups to compare with SADC to shed light on why other regions have attracted more FDI per capita than SADC. The factors that explain SADC’s low FDI inflows are economic fundamentals (e.g., previous growth rates, average income, phone density, and the adult share of population)
    DOI: 10.1596/1813-9450-5416
    URL: Volltext  (Deutschlandweit zugänglich)
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