This paper contributes to the literature comparing the relative performance of financial intermediaries and markets by studying an environment in which a trade-off between risk sharing and growth arises endogenously. Financial intermediaries provide insurance to households against a liquidity...

Countries differ markedly with respect to income per capita. These differences cannot be accounted for by differences in factors of production, which means that measured TFP varies significantly across countries. Countries that have a poorly developed financial intermediation sector tend to be...