This Paper presents a dynamic theory of housing market fluctuations. It develops a life-cycle model where households are heterogeneous with respect to income and preferences, and mortgage lending is restricted by a down-payment requirement. The market interaction of young credit-constrained...

During the last few decades, many emerging markets have lifted restrictions on cross-border financial transactions. The conventional view was that this would allow these countries to: (i) receive capital inflows from advanced countries that would finance higher investment and growth; (ii) insure...

Abstract. U.S. households' debt skyrocketed between 2000 and 2007, and has been falling since. This leveraging (and deleveraging) cycle cannot be accounted for by the liberalization, and subsequent tightening, of credit standards in mortgage markets observed during the same period. We base this...

Using state-level data from India over the period 1983 to 2005, this paper gauges the effect of financial deepening and outreach on rural poverty. Following the 1991 liberalization episode, we find a strong negative relationship between financial deepening, rather than financial breadth, and...

We build a model where sovereign defaults weaken banks’ balance sheets because banks hold sovereign bonds, causing private credit to decline. Stronger financial institutions boost default costs by amplifying these balance-sheet effects. This yields a novel complementarity between public debt...

This paper analyzes the effects of financial liberalization on growth and volatility at the industry level in a large sample of countries. We estimate the impact of liberalization on production, employment, firm entry, capital accumulation, and productivity, using both de facto and de jure...

The paper discusses the process of financial liberalization in Greece and the impact it is likely to have on the conduct of monetary policy. To examine the effectiveness of exchange rate controls in Greece during periods of intense downward pressure on the drachma, we study the behaviour of...

The often volatile behaviour of UK house prices between 1957 and 1994 is analysed in an annual econometric model. Theory suggests that financial liberalization of mortgage markets in the 1980s should have led to notable shifts in house price behaviour. The evidence supports the predictions of...

How does sovereign debt emerge and become sustainable? This paper provides a new answer to this unsolved puzzle. Focusing on the early 19th century, we argue that intermediaries' market power served to overcome information asymmetries and sustained the development of sovereign debt. Relying on...

We study the contribution of foreign science and engineering talent to the creation of new knowledge in the U.S. economy using panel data on 2300 science and engineering (S&E) departments at 100 large American universities from 1973 to 1998. We use macroeconomic shocks and policy changes in...