This paper discusses the major factors which affect Indonesia's industrial competitiveness, specifically the determinants of its industrial technology development. The work first gives an overview of Indonesia's industrial development before and after the Asian economic crisis. Then it discusses...

Jamaica's National Aid for Trade Strategy, Partnerships towards Sustained Economic Growth and Development through Trade, was prepared by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade with the support of the Integration and Trade Sector of the Inter-American Development Bank. The Strategy...

A labor supply and demand model is presented where three main determinants of the wage differential are investigated: trade openness, technology transfer and labor supply. Findings show that increased trade openness is related to reductions in wage differentials.

The 2007 Report on Economic and Social Progress in Latin America analyzes the nature and evolution of sovereign debt in Latin America and discusses the policies that can be followed by countries and international financial institutions (IFIs) to reduce the vulnerabilities associated with it....

Revitalizing the Jamaican Economy: Policies for Sustained Growth aims to improve our understanding of the constraints to social and economic development in Jamaica. It also proposes practical solutions to overcome some of those problems. This book is a collection of studies commissioned by the...

The Bank has prepared a new set of strategies, presented in this volume, for the two overarching objectives established (Sustainable Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction and Promotion of Social Equity) and for each of the four priority areas highlighted in the Institutional Strategy...

Over the last 20 years, Mexico redefined the role of the state in its economy through an ambitious program to liberalize trade, promote efficiency and reduce the size and scope of the state-owned sector. In Mexico, privatization led to a significant improvement in firm performance, as...

Tax expenditures are generally defined as those government expenditures carried out through tax legislation, regulations, and practices that reduce or defer taxes for some taxpayers. There is a general concern that the tax expenditures negatively affect the budget and tax policies, which in turn...

Countercyclical country interest rates have been shown to be both a distinctive characteristic and an important driving force of business cycles in emerging market economies. In order to account for this, most business cycle models of emerging market economies have relied on ad hoc and exogenous...

This paper surveys the recent literature on fiscal sustainability, with particular emphasis on emerging market countries. It discusses the main elements that differentiate emerging market countries from industrial countries and then discusses how probabilistic models can help to evaluate fiscal...