According to the Washington Consensus, developing countries’ growth would benefit from reductions in barriers to trade. However, the empirical basis for judging trade reforms is weak. Econometrics are mostly ad hoc; results are typically not judged against models; policies are poorly measured;...

The paper employs the Commitment to Equity framework to present a first attempt at a comprehensive fiscal incidence analysis for Ukraine, encompassing the revenue and expenditures components of the fiscal system, including direct and indirect taxes, as well as direct, indirect, and in-kind...

The relationship between the abundance of natural resources and socio-economic performance has been a main object of study in the economic development field since Adam Smith. Dominated by the verification of the so called curse of natural resource, the mainstream literature on the topic has been...

This is an update and revision of our 2009 study. Using a broad dataset and an original methodology, this paper reports composite development gaps across economic, social and institutional sectors. We define development gap as the distance between the observed and the expected development level...

The past decade has seen the emergence of numerous rigorous impact evaluations of teacher policies. This paper reviews the economic theory and empirical evidence on eight teacher policy goals: (1) setting clear expectations for teachers; (2) attracting the best into teaching; (3) preparing...

With a new development framework under way and an increasingly urgent need to address political, socioeconomic and environmental issues on a global scale, this is a critical moment for the international development agenda. Almost 15 years after the Millennium Declaration, a new phase for...