Donors have developed new micro-level and local paradigms to address rural development, environmental sustainability, and poverty alleviation to bypass, ignore, and substitute for badly functioning and corrupt states. Yet, states still set the macro-economic, legal, and policy parameters or...

The multiplicity of policies proposed to support the informal sector reflects the lack of a common definition. Although they may produce positive effects, these are limited and fail to constitute a comprehensive strategic approach. The different interpretations in the absence of a common...

This paper explores the relationship of the informal economy to the formal economy and the formal regulatory environment. It begins with a discussion of the concept of the informal economy and its size, composition, and segmentation. It then discusses the linkages between the informal economy...

This paper deals with the social welfare consequences of the stagnation of Latin American growth per capita during the far-reaching economic and social changes that took place during the period 1980-2003. This period of transformation saw large-scale foreign actors gradually increase their...

The paper contends that more attention should be paid to micro savings in view of multiple ways in which it can help poor to deal with economic insecurity. The paper presents information to show that while microsaving programs have spread, their full potential is far from being realized. It...

This paper asks how insurance can be more effectively delivered to the poor, and what its role should be relative to other microfinance programmes, safety nets and informal insurance systems. We focus on the various interactions, including how insurance may crowd out credit and informal...

The paper suggests that, rather than through its narrow, direct financial impact, microfinance may prove to be more potent in reducing insecurity and poverty through its indirect, broader impact leading to a more egalitarian initial endowment distribution that is necessary for the "take-off" of...

The paper reviews attempts to provide insurance against risks afflicting the poorest. It presents empirical evidence on the impact of different types of microinsurance, and recommends the idea of ‘quasi-insurance’—the provision of insurance functions through a non-insurance route—where...

We introduce two separate datasets (The Global Consumption Dataset (GCD) and The Global Income Dataset (GID)) containing an unprecedented portrait of consumption and income of persons over time, within and across countries, around the world. The benchmark version of the dataset presents...

This paper examines data on economic growth and various social indicators for 193 countries over the past 50 years, divided into three periods: 1960-1980, 1980-2000, and 2000-2010. The paper finds that after a sharp slowdown in economic growth and in progress on social indicators during the...