This paper surveys the literature on the relationship between international trade and inclusive growth. It examines claims that the rise in inequality in many countries can be attributed to the concurrent rise in trade competition, especially from EMEs like China, spurring trade tensions and...

This paper investigates the extent to which output has recovered from the Asian crisis. A regime-switching approach that introduces two state variables is used to decompose recessions in a set of six Asian countries into permanent and transitory components. While growth recovered fairly quickly...

This paper investigates the determinants of sustained accelerations in goods and services exports. Strong predictors of export takeoffs include domestic and structural indicators such as lower macroeconomic uncertainty, improved quality of institutions, a depreciated exchange rate, and...

Uncertainty about the export earnings accruing to a country (sometimes referred to as export instability) is an important source of macroeconomic uncertainty in many developing countries. Theory predicts that countries should react to increases in this form of uncertainty by increasing their...

While the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting all countries, output losses vary considerably across countries. We provide a first analysis of robust determinants of observed initial output losses using model-averaging techniques-Weighted Average Least Squares and Bayesian Model Averaging. The results...

One of the most puzzling facts in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) is that output across advanced and emerging economies recovered at a much slower rate than anticipated by most forecasting agencies. This paper delves into the mechanics behind the observed slow recovery and the...

Are policies designed to avert climate change (Climate Change Policies, or CCPs) politically costly? Using data on governmental popular support and the OECD's Environmental Stringency Index, we find that CCPs are not necessarily politically costly: policy design matters. First, only market-based...

This paper provides evidence on the impact of major epidemics from the past two decades on income distribution. The pandemics in our sample, even though much smaller in scale than COVID-19, have led to increases in the Gini coefficient, raised the income share of higher-income deciles, and...

COVID-19 has had a disruptive economic impact in 2020, but how long its impact will persist remains unclear. We offer a prognosis based on an analysis of the effects of five previous major epidemics in this century. We find that these pandemics led to significant and persistent reductions in...

We develop a new Measure of Aggregate Trade Restrictions (MATR) using data from the IMF's Annual Report on Exchange Arrangements and Exchange Restrictions. MATR is an empirical measure of how restrictive official government policy is towards the international flow of goods and services. MATR is...