We examine the effect of regional favoritism on firms’ access to credit. Using firm-level data on a large sample of 29,000 firms covering 48 countries, we investigate the hypothesis that access to credit of firms is higher in the birth regions of national political leaders. We find evidence...

Nauro Campos (University College London) will present his research co-authored with Fabrizio Coricelli (University of Siena, Paris School of Economics and CEPR) and Marco Frigerio (University of Siena) entitled The Political U: New Evidence on Democracy and Income. Jarko Fidrmuc (Zeppelin...

Decades of investment decisions by central planners left communist societies with structures of production ill-prepared for competitive markets. Their vulnerability to liberalization, however, varied across space. Similar to the effects identified in the "China shock'' literature, we hypothesize...

We investigate whether the occurrence of elections affect access to credit for firms. We perform an investigation using firm-level data covering 44 developed and developing countries. We find that elections have a detrimental influence on access to credit: firms are more credit-constrained in...

The literature on institutions and development has often cast societies in a light that contrasts the more inclusive, open-access, and equal ones with other less inclusive ones, but the scholarship comparing Imperial China and Premodern Europe does not fit easily in this framework. We provide a...

The ASE is sponsoring (or co-sponsoring) eight paper sessions and an opening plenary session and Q&A session with Professor Darrick Hamilton (Henry Cohen Professor of Economics and Urban Policy and Director, Institute for the Study of Race, Stratification, and Political Economy, The New School)....

Theme 2020: A Vision for Economics and Social-Political Economy. economics profession and to the larger social economy-- especially whether we are we moving towards greater equality, and what can be done to enhance diversity and equality in the future withWhile all paper and session proposals...

For the ASE sessions at the 2019 ASSA meetings, we welcome proposals for papers/sessions on all aspects of social economics, but preference will be given to papers that explore the implications of questioning presumed mechanical “essences” and instead locating economies thoroughly within the...

Theme: “Democratic Crisis and the Responsibility of Economics” For the ASE sessions at the 2018 ASSA meetings, we welcome proposals for papers/sessions on all aspects of social economics, but preference will be given to papers related to the contemporary democratic crisis, and the...

THEME: Human Development and Poverty Reduction Researchers interested in social economics have traditionally worked on topics that matter for how vulnerable groups fare in society and are affected by public policy. Issues related to the eradication of extreme poverty and investments in human...