The need for graduates who would be productive citizens able to contribute significantly to the Nigerian economy led to the overhaul of the old education system 6-5-4 and the implementation of the 6-3-3-4 system, with its first set of graduates from secondary schools in 1988. The main objective...

Malaria still claims a heavy human and economic toll, specifically in sub-Saharan Africa. Even though the causality between malaria and poverty is presumably bi-directional, malaria plays a role in the economic difficulties of the region. This article provides an analysis of the economic...

In this paper, I explore in an overlapping generations framework, a mechanism motivating a neurobiological poverty trap. Poverty causes stress and depression in individuals susceptible to depression. Poor and depressed individuals discount the future at a higher rate and invest less in the human...

Poor people are trapped in a vicious cycle of intergenerational poverty. This study critically reviews existing literature to explore why long-lasting poverty exists despite various initiatives taken by national and international development organizations (NGOs), charity organizations, and...

The world's poor -- and programs to raise their incomes -- are increasingly concentrated in fragile states. We review the evidence on what interventions work, and whether stimulating employment promotes social stability. Skills training and microfinance have shown little impact on poverty or...

This study examines the impact of the Sierra Leone civil war on household expenditure inequality. The paper exploits three rounds of household survey data for Sierra Leone in an attempt to estimate the impact of the conflict on the distribution of household welfare over both short-run and...

Most countries are rapidly increasing the educational attainment of their workforce. This paper develops a novel framework to study, theoretically and empirically, the effects of an educational expansion on the occupational structure of employment and distinct aspects of the wage distribution -...

This article describes relative poverty in Spain in relation to the other States in the European Union, following the European indicator AROPE. The official data provided by the National Statistical Institute of Spain and by Eurostat, refer to the year 2014 (the last one for which definitive...

Economic analysis of crime and criminal law addresses the question of individual welfare (utility) maximization through optimal allocation of resources and time in accordance to their relative returns. In this paper I first summarize the theoretical and empirical evidence on the nexus between...

Conflict depletes all forms of human and social capital, as well as supporting institutions. The scale of the human damage can overwhelm public action, as there are many competing priorities and resources are often insufficient. What then should be the priorities for 'post-conflict' policy?...