Cross-country growth regressions have in recent years become a major growth industry. The most common purpose of this work has been to investigate the determinants of economic growth. But it is also possible to use the existing growth data to determine the extent to which policy choices help or...

This paper examines the impact of start-up regulations and institutional quality on the level of new business activity in a panel of 119 countries between 2001 and 2012. We find robust evidence that new business creation is significantly lower in countries with excessive barriers to entry, a...

Cross-country growth regressions have in recent years become a major growth industry. The most common purpose of this work has been to investigate the determinants of economic growth. But it is also possible to use the existing growth data to determine the extent to which policy choices help or...

A growing literature relies on natural experiments to establish causal effects in macroeconomics. In diverse applications, natural experiments have been used to verify underlying assumptions of conventional models, quantify specific model parameters, and identify mechanisms that have major...

The volatility of unanticipated output growth in income per capita is detrimental to long-run development, controlling for initial income per capita, population growth, human capital, investment, openness and natural resource dependence. This effect is significant and robust over a wide range of...

The volatility of unanticipated output growth in income per capita is detrimental to long-run development, controlling for initial income per capita, population growth, human capital, investment, openness and natural resource dependence. This effect is significant and robust over a wide range of...

Cross-country growth regressions have in recent years become a major growth industry. The most common purpose of this work has been to investigate the determinants of economic growth. But it is also possible to use the existing growth data to determine the extent to which policy choices help or...

Institutions are now widely believed to be important in explaining performance. In this paper, we analyse whether commonly used measures of institutions have any significant, measurable impact on performance, whether of countries or firms. We look at three ‘levels’ of institutions and...

Institutions are now widely believed to be important in explaining performance. In this paper, we analyze whether commonly used measures of institutions have any significant, measurable impact on performance, whether of countries or firms. We look at three 'levels' of institutions and associated...