Few economic ideas are as intuitive as the notion that increasing investment is the best way to raise future output. This idea was the basis for the theory"capital fundamentalism."Under this view, differences in national stocks of capital were the primary determinants of differences in levels of...

The widely held view that larger families tend to be poorer in developing countries has influenced research and policies. But the basis for this"stylized fact"is questionable, the authors argue. Widely cited evidence of a strong negative correlation between size and consumption per person is...

There are three main approaches to analyzing the effects of aid money and aid-supported reform: before-and-after comparison; control group (simple and modified) studies; and modeling. All three approaches have been used to carry out macroeconomic analysis of policy reform. But before-and-after...

Trade, aid, and investment are more inextricably linked in sub-Saharan Africa than anywhere else in the world, contends the author, whose survey of sub-Saharan Africa's prospects for trade, aid, and investment lead to the following broad conclusions. Developing an outward orientation, improving...

Tanzania embarked on a structural adjustment program in 1986 after a decade of protracted economic decline. Its program was supported by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank and was accompanied by a substantial increase in foreign assistance. After seven years of adjustment the...

The author presents a simple endogenous growth model (with two types of capital) that shows the sizable long-run effects on growth of distortionary policies. The model applies to many different types of distortions of relative prices common in developing countries - for example, price controls,...

Economies benefit from international trade, but joining the world market also exposes them to external shocks. How can the government in Eastern European and developing countries reduce their vulnerability to such shocks? What are appropriate policy responses? The authors examine how external...

The authors present new estimates of long-term total factor productivity (TFP) growth for 83 industrial and developing countries for 1960-87. These estimates are based on new data developed for the research project on total factor productivity growth (and available on diskette). Although based...

Union-nonunion wage differentials have been extensively studied by labor economists, but for lack of data on the developing world the study has been confined largely to the industrial world. This paper is one of the first attempts to empirically examine those differentials in a developing...

Widespread private capital inflows to middle-income countries have surged over the past three years. At the same time, Brady-type debt reduction operations and domestic policy reform took place, indicators of country creditworthiness improved dramatically, and international interest rates...