This paper identifies factors associated with takeoff - a sustained period of high growth following a period of stagnation. We examine a panel of 241 stagnation episodes" from 146 countries, 54 % of these episodes are followed by takeoffs. Countries that experience takeoffs average 2.3% annual...

The estimation of the costs of conflict is currently receiving a lot of attention in the literature. This paper aims to give a thorough overview of the existing literature, first by addressing the history of case studies that address conflict costs and second by looking at the existing body of...

This paper analyzes the distributive impacts of violent conflicts, which is in contrast to previous literature that has focused on the other direction. We use cross-country panel data for the time period 1960-2005 to estimate war-related changes in income inequality. Our results indicate rising...

This paper addresses the lack of connection between theory and empirics in most export diversification - economic development studies. We provide a Ricardian-based theoretical explanation of countries' relative export variety as a function of the level of technology and country size assessed...

The paper presents the dynamics of trade diversity with respect to stages of development in the European context. The analysis focuses on EU27 countries observed across the years 1988-2010 and compared to a sample of 136 international economies at all levels of income per capita. We use product...

This paper presents empirical evidence on the diversification process concerning Polish exports (1994-2010), compared to European and global samples of countries. It analyzes both the commodity structure of Polish trade and the geographical diversification of Poland's trading partners. The...

This paper contributes to trade diversification literature by comparing changes in relative (i.e. assessed in comparison with world patterns) heterogeneity of import and export structures in the process of economic development. In particular, by focusing on the diversification of imports, we add...

We define the notion of 'de facto fiscal space' of a country as the outstanding public debt relative to the de facto tax base, where the latter measures the realized tax collection, averaged across several years to smooth for business cycle fluctuations. We apply this concept to account for the...

We define the notion of 'de facto fiscal space' of a country as the inverse of the outstanding public debt relative to the de facto tax base, where the latter measures the realized tax collection, averaged across several years to smooth for business cycle fluctuations. We apply this concept to...