This research explores the economic causes and consequences of language structures. It advances the hypothesis and establishes empirically that variations in pre-industrial geographical characteristics that were conducive to higher return to agricultural investment, larger gender gap in...

The fundamental, underlying factors of development are often neglected when analyzing the question why countries experience a growth slowdown at the middle-income range. Although these so-called `deep determinants' such as geography and institutions have been found to be decisive for the break...

The so-called 'deep determinants' of economic growth and development (namely, geography, institutions, and integration) have been found to be decisive for the break out of stagnation and for explaining cross-country income differences by many empirical studies. However, so far, very little has...

There is a significant body of literature arguing that institutional quality is the key for long run economic growth and development. While the majority of these studies are based on cross-country growth regression, in our paper, we focus on the institution-economic growth nexus within a...

This research explores the historical roots of the division of labor in pre-modern societies. It advances the hypothesis and establishes empirically that intra-ethnic diversity had a positive effect on the division of labor across ethnicities in the pre-modern era. Exploiting a variety of...

Even before the onset of the 2008 global financial crisis and ongoing European debt crisis, much attention has been given to the re-emergence of the Asian giants, the People's Republic of China (PRC) and India. Both countries have attained unprecedented growth and economic development-PRC and...

The problem faced by many of the economies making up the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is whether they can avoid the middle-income trap and advance to the high-income level. What is needed for them to avoid the middle-income trap? This paper attempts to answer this question by...

Unskilled labor is the abundant resource in many developing countries, especially at an early stage of their development. Yet, even as at given technologies labor markets have not cleared, neo-classical economists have rejected the notion of an institutional or bargaining wage not based on...

This research explores the economic causes and consequences of language structures. It advances the hypothesis and establishes empirically that variations in pre-industrial geographical characteristics that were conducive to higher return to agricultural investment, larger gender gap in...

Are developing-world cities engines of opportunities for low-wage earners? In this study, we track a cohort of young low-income workers in Brazil for thirteen years to explore the contribution of factors such as industrial structure and skill segregation on upward income mobility. We find that...