Convergence concerns poor economies catching up with rich ones. At is- sue is what happens to the cross sectional distribution of economies, not whether a single economy tends towards its own steady state. It is the latter, however, that has preoccupied the traditional approach to con- vergence...

This paper analyzes the welfare benefits from falling relative prices of IT (information technology) goods across a wide range of countries. We find, using two separate methodologies and datasets, that welfare benefits mainly accrue to users of IT, not their producers, because of falling...

This paper studies growth and inequality in China and India – two economies that account for a third of the world’s population. By modelling growth and inequality as components in a joint stochastic process, the paper calibrates the impact each has on different welfare indicators and on the...

This paper examines the impact of mass media and information and commu- nications technologies (ICT) as knowledge-based infrastructures on economic development. The results suggest that both mass media and ICT penetra- tion are negatively associated with corruption. This result holds across both...

This paper attempts to draw lessons for the New Economy from what economists know about technology dissemination and economic growth. It argues that what is most notable about the New Economy is that it is knowledge-driven, not just in the sense that knowledge now assumes increasing importance...

Convergence concerns the poor catching up with the rich|if not instan- taneously, then at least having a tendency to do so. When poor and rich here refer to entire economies, then whether convergence occurs is traditionally viewed as just a side consequence of a more central ques- tion, namely...

Per capita incomes across European regions are not equal and do not stay constant; regional income distributions uctuate over time. Such a process could have many possible limiting outcomes: complete equal- ity (convergence), stratication, and continually increasing inequality are but three...

This paper exploits data on the pattern of violence across regions and over time to estimate the impact of the peace process in Northern Ireland on house prices. We begin with a linear model that estimates the average treatment effect of a conflictrelated killing on house prices - showing a...

This paper explores the impact of trade on growth when firms are heterogeneous. We find that greater openness produces anti-and pro-growth effects. The Melitz-model selection effects raises the expected cost of introducing a new variety and this tends to slow the rate of new-variety introduction...

The study of welfare capitalism is concerned with a founding question of political economy, namely how capitalism and democracy can be combined. Ever since the publication of Esping-Andersen’s Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism in 1990, the answer was sought in identifying ideal types of...