The authors examine the extent to which permanent terms-of-trade shocks have an asymmetric effect on private savings. Using a simple three-period model, they show that if households expect to face binding constraints on borrowing in bad states of nature (when the economy is in a long trough...

The authors propose a two-step approach for assessing the extent to which the fall in credit in crisis-stricken East Asian countries was a supply- or demand-induced phenomenon. The first step involves estimating a demand function for excess liquid assets held by commercial banks. The second step...

This paper studies the effects of policies aimed at mitigating discrimination against women in the marketplace on the gender wage gap, decisions to invest in skills, the composition of employment and unemployment, and long-run growth. The analysis uses a gender-based overlapping generations...

In the past few years, a number of central banks have adopted inflation targeting for monetary policy. The author provides an introduction to inflation targeting, with an emphasis on analytical issues, and the recent experience of middle- and high-income developing countries (which have...

The authors study the dynamics of output, consumption, and real wages induced by a disinflation program based on permanent and temporary reductions in the nominal devaluation rate. They use an intertemporal optimizing model of a small open economy in which domestic households face imperfect...

The author provides a selective review of the recent analytical and empirical literature on the benefits and costs of international financial integration. He discusses the impact of financial openness on consumption, investment, and growth, and the impact of foreign bank entry on the domestic...

The author examines whether output contraction associated with cyclical output fluctuations and economic crises have an asymmetric effect on poverty. He identifies four potential sources of asymmetry: expectations and cofident factors, credit rationing at the firm level (induced by either...

Agenor attempts to examine analytically and empirically the extent to which globalization affects the poor in low- and middle-income countries. He begins with a description of various channels through which trade openness and financial integration may have an adverse effect on poverty. However,...

The author describes a specialized and less data-intensive version of the Integrated Macroeconomic Model for Poverty Analysis (IMMPA) developed by Agenor, Izquierdo, and Fofack (2003) and Agenor, Fernandes, Haddad, and van der Mensbrugghe (2002). The mini-IMMPA focuses only on the "real" side...

The authors study the impact of labor market policies on unemployment in Morocco. They begin by reviewing the main features of the labor market. Then they present a quantitative framework that captures many of these features-such as a large public sector, high redundancy payments, powerful trade...