What major insights have emerged from development economics in the past decade, and how do they matter for the World Bank? This challenging question was recently posed by World Bank Group President David Malpass to the staff of the Development Research Group. This paper assembles a set of 13...

The article analyzes the tax burden through the branch division of the national economy. The purpose of this segmentation is to know the tax burden on specific economic areas. There are proposed and evaluated a set of coefficients and indicators for assessing the efficiency of the tax system....

Although microfinance has played a significant role in providing a wide range of financial products and services, many microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Kenya still face major challenges with efficiently and effectively delivering microfinance services in the country. As the demand for these...

This paper illustrates the use of real options principles to value prototypical resource and industryinvestment projects. It captures important competitive/strategic dimensions in a step-by-stepanalysis of investment decisions (options) under uncertainty. It compares and contrasts...

This essay looks at the bidirectional relationship between financial history and financial economics. It begins by giving a brief history of financial economics by outlining the main topics of interest to financial economists. It then documents and explains the increasing influence of financial...

Microcredit has expanded rapidly since its beginnings in the last 1970s, but whether and how much it reduces poverty is the subject of intense debate. Generally it depends on how the program is implemented and the set of policies that regulate it. In this spirit, microcredit impacts in the...