This paper argues that official development assistance (foreign aid) is partly responsible for the lack of structural change in Africa. Africa's development partners have devoted too few resources and too little attention to two critical constraints to private investment, infrastructure and...

Growth and poverty reduction in Africa are weakly linked. This paper argues that the reason is that Africa has failed to create enough good jobs. Structural transformation - the relative growth of employment in high productivity sectors - has not featured in Africa's post-1995 growth story. As a...

Aid providers frequently link supporting small firms to job creation. Small firms create about half of new jobs in Africa, but they also have higher failure rates. Ignoring firm exit exaggerates net employment growth. Using panel data for Ethiopia, we find that small and large enterprises create...