This chapter describes how the spatial distribution of economic activity changes as economies develop and grow. We start with the relation between development and rural-urban migration. Moving beyond the coarse rural-urban distinction, we then focus on the continuum of locations in an economy...

This paper examines the relationship between openness and within-country regional inequality across 28 countries over the period 1975-2005. In particular, it tests a) whether increases in trade lead to rising inequalities, b) whether these inequalities recede in time, and c) whether increases in...

A new survey finds that only 17 drugs are under active development for maternal health indications, which is less than 3% of the pipeline in cardiovascular health (660 drugs). The international agencies have forgotten pregnant women. Given the unacceptably high number of maternal and perinatal...

More than 13% of the global burden of disease for mental disorders is due to neuro psychiatric disorders, and over 70% of this burden lies in low- and middleincome countries. Suicide is one of the leading causes of death globally for all ages. Despite this burden, mental illness has thus far not...

The implications of the rule of Chiang Kai-shek and his son Chiang Ching-kuo in Taiwan (1950–1988) for the Taiwan Strait Crises is examined, especially the third one af??ter the Cold War and potential others to come in the future. [ISDP Asia Papers]....

In this context, higher education as well as research and development (R&D) have long since ceased to be purely the domain of the developed Western economies. Numerous regions of the world, some in the emerging markets in particular – the often-cited BRIC countries – are catching...

This paper examines the effect of U.S. food aid on conflict in recipient countries (these include Asian countries like Afghanistan, Sri Lanka). To establish a causal relationship, time variation in food aid is exploited which is caused by fluctuations in U.S. wheat production together with...

The paper shows that monetary policy shocks exert a substantial effect on the size and composition of capital flows and the trade balance for the United States, with a 100 basis point easing raising net capital inflows and lowering the trade balance by 1% of GDP, and explaining about 20-25% of...

This paper investigates why the slope of the yield curve predicts future economic activity in Germany and the United States. A structural VAR is used to identify aggregate supply, aggregate demand, monetary policy and inflation scare shocks and to analyse their effects on the real, nominal and...

A state school system should be expected to reduce income inequality and to make intergenerational mobility easier. It is therefore somewhat surprising to observe that Italy, in comparison to the United States, displays less inequality between occupational incomes, but lower intergenerational...