Financial liberalization is a highly controversial policy. Despite the fact that almost all the regions of the world have undergone liberalization of their financial markets, its effect on the performance of different economic sectors remains a question. In our research, we find that financial...

This paper examines the reasons behind the sudden increase and the slow recovery of unemployment in Chile after the economic slowdown that took place in 1998 as a result of the Asian Crisis. To do so, we analyze the response of employment and wages to this economic shock and show that Chile...

We revisit the public banks debate, survey the theoretical arguments and test the robustness (and expand) the existing empirical evidence. While we find some support for the view that public banks do not allocate credit optimally, we also report indicative evidence that they exert a positive...

This paper estimates the elasticity of substitution of U.S. imports using detailed trade data over the 1990-2003 period. The authors use a two-stage least squares framework in order to identify the elasticity parameter of interest. The authors use the elasticity estimates to assess the extent to...

"After decades of trial, error, and occasional regress the pieces of a successful Latin American economic model can be seen scattered among the leading economies of the region. The most traditional macroeconomic maladies of the emerging world - such as chronic fiscal imbalances and monetary...