Providing clean water requires maintenance, as well as the initial connections that are typically measured. Frequently, the water supply fails in the developing world, especially when users don't pay the marginal cost of water. This paper uses the timing of frequent, unexpected water service...

Fresh water supplies increasingly are under stress in many parts of the world due to rising populations, higher per capita incomes and corresponding consumption, greater environmental concerns, and the effects of climate change. Water rights and markets are part of the institutional menus for...

The construction of municipal water systems was a major event in the history of American cities -- bringing relief from disease, providing resources to combat fires, attracting business investment, and promoting development generally. Although the first large-scale municipal water system in the...

We estimate the impacts of two interventions implemented as field experiments in informal settlements by Nairobi’s water and sanitation utility to improve revenue collection efficiency and last mile connection loan repayment: (i) face-to-face engagement between utility staff and customers to...

The European Union and the United States operate different variants of market capitalism. The EU model uses social dialogue institutions to help determine economic outcomes, particularly in the labor market, whereas the US relies more on market forces. The theory of competitive markets provides...

Since the 1990s, R&D has become less geographically concentrated, and has seen especially fast growth in emerging markets. One of the distinguishing features of the R&D globalization phenomenon is its concentration within the software/IT domain; the increase in foreign R&D has been largely...

In this paper we compare sources of economic growth in Japan and the United States from 1975 through 2003, focusing on the role of information technology (IT). We have adjusted Japanese data to conform to U.S. definitions in order to provide a rigorous comparison between the two economies. The...

Cities generate negative, as well as positive, externalities; addressing those externalities requires both infrastructure and institutions. Providing clean water and removing refuse requires water and sewer pipes, but the urban poor are often unwilling to pay for the costs of that piping....