Most conventional accounts of India's recent economic performance associate the pick-up in economic growth with the liberalization of 1991. This paper demonstrates that the transition to high growth occured around 1980, a full decade before economic liberalization. We investigate a number of...

The distribution of human capital and income lies at the center of a nexus of forces that shape a country's economic, institutional and technological structure. I develop here a unified model to analyze these interactions and their growth consequences. Five main issues are addressed. First, I...

This paper analyzes the role productivity growth had on disinflation in Chile during the 1990s. It argues that productivity growth was key in avoiding the output costs of stabilization in a highly indexed economy. Disinflation from the early 1990s through 1998 was costless. Among the many...

After three years of near stagnation, the mood in Europe is definitely gloomy. Many doubt that the European model has a future. In this paper, I argue that things are not so bad, and there is room for optimism. Over the last thirty years, productivity growth has been much higher in Europe than...

We survey and assess the literature on the positive and negative effects of ethnic diversity on economic policies and outcomes. Our focus is on both focus both cities in developed countries (the US) and villages in developing countries. We also consider the endogenous formation of political...

There is no agreement regarding the growth-enhancing effects of financial liberalization, mainly because it is associated with risky international bank flows, lending booms, and crises. In this paper we make the case for liberalization despite the occurrence of crises. We show that in developing...

Mexico, a prominent liberalizer, failed to attain stellar gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the 1990s, and since 2001 its GDP and exports have stagnated. In this paper we argue that the lack of spectacular growth in Mexico cannot be blamed on either the North American Free Trade Agreement...

In this paper I use a panel data set to investigate the mechanics of sudden stops of capital inflows and current account reversals. I am particularly interested in four questions: (a) What is the relationship between sudden stops and current account reversals? (b) To what extent does financial...

This paper evaluates how much of the economics profession has evaluated the evidence on the relationship between international trade and economic growth. The paper highlights the basic approaches to the trade and growth question that the literature has adopted. The case is made that more...

We analyze the relationship between financial development and inter-industry resource allocation in the short- and long-run. We suggest that in the long-run, economies with high rates of financial development will devote relatively more resources to industries with a 'natural' reliance on...