Evidence-based economic policies - pragmatic policies that work - played a major role in Asia's success in raising its living standards in the last half century. However, growth prospects are now threatened by rising income inequality and environmental degradation if Asia continues on its...

In the past 10 years, the service sector has been a significant contributor to overall economic growth in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, Uzbekistan, and Viet Nam. Sector growth has been supported by strong industrial growth in some while in others the critical factors have been...

The recent rise of nonperforming loans (NPLs) in some Asian economies calls for close analysis of the determinants, the potential macrofinancial feedback effects, and the implications for financial stability in the region. Using a dynamic panel model, we assess the determinants of the evolution...

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'...

Asia's rapid population aging fortifies the case for strengthening human capital investments. Further, the experience of the newly industrialized economies suggests that human capital investments will be a vital ingredient of the transition from middle income to high income. Those investments...

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...

Deflation has emerged as a new concern for Asian policy makers. The traditional view is that deflation can lead to a vicious cycle of falling demand and prices, and is thus a dangerous condition. However, another school of thought emphasizes the role of positive supply shocks and takes a more...

The recent slowdown of the People's Republic of China (PRC) has led to question to what extent the PRC demand of commodities can have an impact on commodity prices. We take into account the fact that commodity prices are characterized by structural breaks, and to this end we make use of novel...

Using the Burke, Hsiang, and Miguel (2015) framework, we examine the nonlinear response effect of economic growth to historic temperature and precipitation fluctuations. We confirm that aside from the significant effect of rising temperature on agricultural production, industrial production and...

Climate-related natural disaster shocks are expected to rise as the earth is getting warmer, which will adversely affect growth prospects globally. Current robust estimates of the effects of typhoons and droughts point to both short- and long-term declines in national incomes compared to...