The debate over the impact of regional trade agreements (RTAs) on world welfare hinges upon (1) whether they are net trade creating or trade diverting and (2) whether they impede multilateral trade liberalization. Theoretical models are ambiguous on these issues. We summarize the insights from...

Egypt has a large food subsidy program that has created a relatively effective social safety net, but it has also drained budgetary resources and proved to be poorly targeted toward the poor. Discussions about reforming the system to improve its effectiveness have run into extreme political...

This paper reviews design features by which safety nets might do more with less. It reviews the current evidence on their success in practice–including three brief reviews of southern Africa experience–and suggests a role for future policy research in furthering the goal of designing safety...

Many of the challenges facing children now are a function of the changing times, including increases in urbanization, political violence, changing family forms, and, in some a cases, decreased supplies of adequate food. This paper reviews the evolving nature of these risks. In addition, the...

"A simple dynamic panel model is used to capture persistence in poverty. This simple model allows a more accurate derivation of the permanent level of the measure of well-being from which persistent poverty is defined. Using a longitudinal dataset from the United States of America, the results...