"Assesses a new 'tournament' approach promising improvement on the performance of conventional foreign aid methods, where beneficiary groups compete to achieve the best implementation of a particular project. Evaluates performances, sustainability, time frames, and costs of recent applications....

Studies of early U.S. growth traditionally have emphasized real-sector explanations for an acceleration that by many accounts became detectable between 1815 and 1840. Interestingly, the establishment of the nation's basic financial structure predated by three decades the canals, railroads, and...