Does trade openness cause higher GDP per capita? Since the seminal instrumental variables (IV) estimates of Frankel and Romer [F&R](1999) important doubts have surfaced. Is the correlation spurious and driven by omitted geographical and institutional variables? In this paper, we generalize F&R's...

Does trade openness cause higher GDP per capita? Since the seminal instrumental variables (IV) estimates of Frankel and Romer [F&R](1999) important doubts have surfaced. Is the correlation spurious and driven by omitted geographical and institutional variables? In this paper, we generalize F&R's...

This paper investigates the influence of international openness on economic growth in a sample of 32 European economies. The usual approach in the literature on the topic is to observe the impact of trade openness on growth. We, however, broaden this standard approach and analyse not only...

This article presents an econometric analysis for the effects of fixed broadband penetration on the growth rate of GDP per capita for a panel of 35 developed and developing countries over an annual period of 33 years (1981 - 2013). The article contributes to the telecommunications literature by...

Over 10 years ago, Feld and Voigt (2003) introduced the first indicator for objectively meas-uring the actual independence of the judiciary and demonstrated its utility in a large cross-section of countries. The indicator has been widely used, but also criticized. This paper pre-sents more...

The question of convergence between poor and rich countries is a central issue in economic growth debate in the last years. This paper investigates the β-conditional convergence of the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region towards the Euro Zone using a set of macroeconomic, institutional...

This paper examines the contribution of administrative and procedural transaction costs to economic growth under common legal system. We show that administrative and procedural costs vary quite a lot even within the institutional environment sharing the common legal system. States with...