In this paper, we argue that the case for universal compulsory education for sub-Saharan Africa might have been overstated. We capture the African situation through a heterogeneous-agent model, in which high costs of education relative to income and the skill premium cause the economy to...

Using data on formal manufacturing plants in India, we report a large but imprecise speedup in productivity growth starting in the early 1990s (e.g., 1993-2007 compared to 1980-1992). We trace it to productivity growth within large plants (200 workers or more), as opposed to reallocation across...

In this paper, we use a general equilibrium model of endogenous growth in which there is heterogeneity in skill, income, and tax rates to evaluate the effect of progressivity of taxes on growth and welfare. In this framework, changes in the progressivity of tax rates can have positive growth...