A recently much debated issue is why observed investment and growth rates inpoor countries are lower than traditional theory predicts. Empirical evidencesuggests that social and political instability is a major reason for thedivergence between poor and rich countries. However, there is still the...

We examine how fiscal rules influence economic growth. The results show that constitutional fiscal rules promoted growth from the Industrial Revolution until World War II (1789-1950) and also increased modern economic growth (1985-2015). To address selection on unobservables, we conduct a...

We provide evidence that political instability deteriorates economic growth. We establish this result based on panel difference-in-differences strategies and dynamic panel data models using a large sample of 180 countries, a novel geocoded dataset for 2,660 regions, and micro data for about...

We examine how fiscal rules influence economic growth. The results show that constitutional fiscal rules promoted growth from the Industrial Revolution until World War II (1789-1950) and also increased modern economic growth (1985-2015). To address selection on unobservables, we conduct a...

We provide evidence that political instability deteriorates economic growth. We establish this result based on panel difference-in-differences strategies and dynamic panel data models using a large sample of 180 countries, a novel geocoded dataset for 2,660 regions, and micro data for about...

Are cultural differences good or bad for economic development? Can cultural differences generate conflicts and, therefore, retard economic development? Or can cultural diversity spur creativity and improve economic welfare? These are the type of questions that this chapter addresses. There are...

This article investigates economic performance when enforceable property rights are missing and basic needs matter for consumption. It suggests a new view of the so-called voracity effect according to which windfall gains in productivity induce behavior that leads to lower economic growth....

A fundamental requirement of market economies is the security of ownership claims to property. Yet history is littered with cases of challenges to these claims. A large literature has found contradictory evidence for the effect of income and income inequality on revolt, possibly due to omitted...

Existing indices of ethnic diversity are generally based on pre-defined groups, disregarding the (dis)similarities between them. This paper proposes an index that includes the dissimilarity in language, ethno-racial characteristcs and religion between groups. The resulting distance-adjusted...

China’s provision of development finance to other countries is sizable but reliable information is scarce. We introduce a new open source methodology for collecting project-level development finance information and create a database of Chinese official finance to Africa from 2000 - 2011. We...