Developing Asia has undergone a dramatic shift over the past 5 decades from a region of mainly low-income economies toward one that is largely middle income. Compared with world aggregate data, developing Asia now has a much greater proportion of middle-income economies. The region faces the...

Relative to other developing regions, developing Asia has experienced a slower decline in employment share in agriculture, compared to its output share; a rapid growth in labor and land productivity; and a shift from agricultural output from traditional to high-value products. The most successful...

We analyze and compare the patterns of economic growth and development in the Japan, the People's Republic of China, and the Republic of Korea in the postwar period. The geographical proximity and cultural affinity between the three countries, as well as the key role of the development state in...

Changes in the population age structure can have a significant effect on fiscal sustainability since they can affect both government revenues and expenditures. For example, population aging will increase expenditures on the elderly while reducing potential growth and hence revenues. In this...

We review the growth experience of middle-income countries. Economic factors associated with growth appear to differ between middle income and other countries. The efficiency of the financial system is importantly related to the growth rate in low- and middle-income countries, but appears to...

This paper reviews what the profession has learned during the last 25 years about East Asia's growth using growth accounting exercises and estimations of production functions. The publication of Alwyn Young's (1992, 1994, 1995) and Jong-Il Kim and Lawrence Lau's (1994) studies, and Paul...

This paper estimates the growth impact of disasters, with a focus on developing Asia and its subregions. It finds that severe disasters slow down annual growth in the Pacific island countries by between 1 and 2 percentage points on average. This should come as no surprise, given these economies'...