All interested parties seem to agree that it is important to be able to monitor public sector performance at the sectoral level, but most current work based on multi-country databases does not lend itself to country-specific conclusions. This is due to a large extent to major data limitations...

All interested parties seem to agree that it is important to be able to monitor public sector performance at the sectoral level, but most current work based on multi-country databases does not lend itself to country-specific conclusions. This is due to a large extent to major data limitations...

What major insights have emerged from development economics in the past decade, and how do they matter for the World Bank? This challenging question was recently posed by World Bank Group President David Malpass to the staff of the Development Research Group. This paper assembles a set of 13...

This paper shows that the creation of an independent regulatory agency is often not a necessary or sufficient condition to help attract private participation in the operation and financing of the water and sanitation sector in developing countries. However, the odds of an impact are...

Microfinance is generally seen as a way to fix credit markets and unleash the productive capacities of poor people who are dependent on self-employment. The microfinance sector has grown quickly since the 1990s, paving the way for other forms of social enterprise and social investment. But...

Conventional wisdom suggests too little information and communication technologies (ICT) in poor countries. Indeed, within 70 countries at various levels of development, there is a positive relationship between income per capita and the capital share of ICT. While this regularity is consistent...

In countries with limited access to finance, firms accumulate retained earnings to finance indivisible investment projects. McKinnon (1973) illustrates that when cash is used as a primary store of value, inflation may discourage investment as it increases the cost of accumulating retained...

This paper estimates the effect of government investment on private investment in a sample of 39 low-income countries. Fluctuations in a predetermined component of disbursements on loans from official creditors to developing country governments are used as an instrument for fluctuations in...