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...

Using World Bank PovcalNet data from 1974-2018 for 135 countries, this paper approximates the identity that links growth in mean incomes and changes in the distribution of relative incomes to reductions in absolute poverty, and, in turn, examines the role of income inequality for poverty...

This paper presents an analysis of the effect of remittances on the current account in developing and emerging economies, incorporating an assessment of the extent to which exchange rate regimes impact the relationship. The main findings suggest there is a positive effect of remittances on the...

The debate on the environment-poverty nexus is inconclusive, with past research unable to identify the causal dynamics. This paper uses a unique global panel data set that links (survey and census derived) poverty data to measures of environmental quality at the subnational level. The analysis...

This study investigates the World Bank's use of lending and non-lending instruments to affect the policy priorities of developing countries. In a typical year, the World Bank lends more than USD 30 billion to its client countries. It also spends approximately USD 200 million on the provision of...

What major insights have emerged from development economics in the past decade, and how do they matter for the World Bank? This challenging question was recently posed by World Bank Group President David Malpass to the staff of the Development Research Group. This paper assembles a set of 13...

This paper presents a review of studies that estimate the cost of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Although the Sustainable Development Goals provide useful benchmarks for fiscal authorities and donors, typical cross-country costing exercises can be misleading, for a variety of...

Global potential output growth has been flagging. At 2.5 percent in 2013-17, post-crisis potential growth is 0.5 percentage point below its longer-term average and 0.9 percentage point below its average a decade ago. Compared with a decade ago, potential growth has declined 0.8 percentage point...

This paper uses data from Sri Lanka and Tanzania to evaluate the benefits of combining household surveys with geographically comprehensive geospatial indicators to generate small area estimates of non-monetary poverty. The preferred estimates are generated by utilizing subarea-level geospatial...

This study uses a computable general equilibrium model to analyze various policy scenarios for a carbon tax on greenhouse gas emissions from petroleum fuels and kerosene in Ethiopia. The carbon tax starts at USD 5 per ton of carbon dioxide in 2018 and rises to USD 30 per ton in 2030. Different...