The rise of a crisis-prone banking sector and its political power has received significant attention following the most recent financial crisis. The crisis sparked a growing interest in understanding how and why we have created a world of large, unstable banks. Excessive banking activity arose...

Industrial specialization has important implications for economic performance; therefore, understanding its determinants is of key policy relevance. This paper quantifies the relationship between factor endowments, policies and institutions and patterns of industrial specialisation in production...

This paper quantifies the importance of different determinants of trade at the industry level using a sample of 54 OECD and non-OECD economies. The empirical methodology extends the approach of previous empirical studies to explicitly quantify the impact that trading partners’ factor...

This paper examines the link between barriers to trade and investment and productivity performance, in the United Kingdom and selected European countries using both firm-level and sectoral data. Barriers to trade and investment appear to be a robust determinant of productivity in the long term....

During the commodity price spikes in 2007-08 and 2010-11, several countries implemented temporary export restrictions on staple foods in an attempt to protect domestic consumers from rising and volatile prices. The impacts of these policies, however, are not limited to the countries that are...

Potential economic benefits of integrity and anti-corruption policies seem large. Nevertheless, much of the existing empirical evidence lacks precise and actionable policy indicators that could guide policy makers on tangible improvements of successful reforms. To move the policy analysis...