A model of firm innovation illustrates the effects of the threat of imitation and product varieties on a representative firm's decision to invest in research and development to produce new product varieties. The model motivates two empirical questions: (1) Is research and development partially...

Recent research highlights the relationship between economic development and productive diversification, which may be hindered by market failures. After identifying stages of diversification in disaggregated export data, the authors develop a metric for the flows of export "discoveries," or...

Public debt in developing economies rose at a fast clip during 2020-21, at least partly due to the onset of the global Covid-19 pandemic. Nobel laureate Paul Krugman opined in early 2021 that "fighting covid is like fighting a war." This paper argues that the Covid-19 pandemic shares many traits...

The debate over the curse of natural resources has haunted developing countries for decades if not centuries. A review of existing empirical evidence suggests that the curse remains elusive. The fragile negative effect of natural resources on economic growth might be due to international...

Using a new global data base on patents and innovation inputs, the authors examine the process of knowledge creation measured by the dynamic relationship between research and development and U.S. patents granted. They confirm at the country level the recurrent micro-level finding of a strong...