The formal private sector has a key role to play in fostering growth and reducing unemployment in South Africa—strengthening its performance is therefore critical. This paper looks at firm behaviour, firm entry and exit, job outcomes, and productivity dynamics using firm-level administrative...

Does democratization promote economic competition? This paper documents that the disruption of political connections associated with Suharto’s fall had a modest pro-competitive effect on Indonesian manufacturing industries. Firms with connections to Suharto lost substantial market share...

For decades, manufacturers around the world have outsourced production to countries with lower labor costs. However, there is a concern that robotization in high-income countries will challenge this shifting international division of labor known as the "flying geese" paradigm. Greenfield foreign...

Using manufacturing plant-level census data, this paper demonstrates that minimum wage increases in Indonesia reduced gender wage gaps among production workers, with heterogeneous impacts by level of education and position of the firm in the wage distribution. Paradoxically, educated women...

Using a newly compiled database of women's property rights and legal capacity covering 100 countries over 50 years, this paper analyzes the triggers and barriers to reform. The database documents gender gaps in the ability to access and own assets, to sign legal documents in one's own name, and...

This paper examines whether demands for bribes for particular government services are associated with expedited or delayed policy implementation. The "grease the wheels" hypothesis, which contends that bribes act as speed money, implies three testable predictions. First, on average, bribe...

Researchers have decried the limited supply of objective, comparable firm-level data from developing countries. The author describes a new database that helps fill this information gap. The database has detailed records on 4000 firms operating in Indonesia, the Republic of Korea, Malaysia, the...

Touted as an important commitment device that attracts foreign investors, the number of bilateral investment treaties (BITs) ratified by developing countries has grown dramatically. The author tests empirically whether BITs have actually had an important role in increasing the foreign direct...

Drawing on recently completed firm-level surveys in Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Honduras, India, Nicaragua, Pakistan, and Peru, this paper investigates the relationship between investment climate and international integration. These standardized surveys of large, random samples of firms in common...

This study uses a newly compiled database of women's property rights and legal capacity covering 100 countries over 50 years to test for the impact of legal reforms on employment, health, and education outcomes for women and girls. The database demonstrates gender gaps in the ability to access...