This paper documents the income distribution changes experienced by Argentina during the last decades. Inequality substantially increased, and despite economic growth during some periods, poverty also went significantly up. Two types of episodes have shaped Argentina's income distribution: deep...

Given the unclear results in Latin America's past experience with free trade areas and customs unions, one wonders whether the present degree of enthusiasm about the prospects of a much more grandiose effort in the same direction (the Free Trade Area of the Americas [FTAA]) is really justified....

This study advocates the adoption of an alternative development model in Suriname. Suriname adopted a state-centered and inward-looking development model in the early 1980s, although elements of the model had been present long before that time.

This document discusses the impact of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) and their effect on the pattern of trade. Specifically, this document addresses trade liberalization, preferential tariff liberalization, and obstacles to market access liberalization. This document is based on chapter 3 of the...

This paper outlines the steps that the Government of Cyprus took to transform its tax system between 1990 and 2001 in order to prepare itself for admission into the European Union. Cyprus has many of the same economic features as the countries of the Caribbean and Central American regions. In...

The purpose of this paper is, precisely, to reflect on the most appropriate policies to take advantage of the economic welfare that may originate from an integration process in favor of lesser-developed partners.

MERCOSUR Report No. 16 - July 2010-June 2011 - analyzes the macroeconomic outlook and trade flows of the Southern Common Market (MERCOSUR) countries, as well as the main aspects of the block's integration process, in terms both of its internal and external agendas.

This paper discusses the importance and applicability of economic instruments in the context of water management. The paper presents a typology and associated examples of implementation from European Union (EU) countries and Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries....

This report discusses the effect of global integration through trade and investment liberalization on small economies. Findings included the idea that small states are more vulnerable and experience greater income volatility than larger states, and that the sources of this vulnerability are...

A tax reform process is now in course in Brazil. It started in 1995, when the President of the Republic presented to the National Congress a proposal to amend the chapter on the tax system of the Brazilian Federal Constitution (PEC 175/95). During the more than seven years of stop-and-go...