Profitability change can be decomposed into the product of a total factor productivity (TFP) index and an index measuring changes in relative prices. Many TFP indexes can be further decomposed into measures of technical change, technical efficiency change, scale efficiency change and mix...

This primer aims to provide IMF macroeconomists with the essential information they need in situations where they must address issues concerning health sector policy and when they have significant macroeconomic implications. Such issues can also affect equity and growth and are fundamental to...

This paper investigates economies of scale (ES) in financial intermediation as a source of equilibrium indeterminacy. Consumption in the model can be purchased with currency and deposits, and ES in intermediation implies that deposit costs are decreasing in aggregate deposits. The results...

Trading blocks can help or hinder the liberalization of world trade. A determining factor is whether trade within the block is organized around traditional comparative advantages, or around economies of scale. Regional free trade agreements such as NAFTA can be a substitutes for global free...

After presenting a broad review of Friedrich List's infant industry argument (Erziehungszollargument) departing from collected works of List, this study aims to compare his ideas with that of Hamilton, Say, Mill, Bastable and Kemp. It underlines the restricted theoretical validity of the...

We apply the collective consumption model of Browning et al. (2010) to analyse economic well-being and poverty among the elderly. The model focuses on individual preferences, a consumption technology that captures the economies of scale of living in a couple, and a sharing rule that governs the...

Drawing on international trade and industrial organisation theories, this paper identifies variable affecting (a) export decision function i.e. to export or sell in domestic market, and (b) export performance function i.e. share of exports in output. These functions are estimated for Garment and...

Several recent papers report a puzzling pattern of food demand falling as household size rises at constant per capita expenditure, especially in poorer countries. This pattern is contrary to a widely used model of scale economics. This paper exploits within-country differences in household...