Since 2000, Armenia's economic performance has been remarkable. Real economic growth has averaged 11 percent a year, annual inflation has averaged 3 percent, and poverty and inequality have fallen. The country has outperformed other low-income countries including other members of the...

The striking turnaround in the Netherlands' economic performance over the past decade and a half has attracted widespread attention. Emerging from deep recession and high unemployment in the early 1980s, the economy shifted to a pace of growth more rapid than that in neighboring economies, and...

Since the mid-1960s, Thailand's growth performance has been exceptional. Although hard hit by the external shocks fo the late 1970s and the early 1980s that proved severely destabilizing to many developing countries, Thailand showed remarkable reslience: price stability was quickly restored, and...

The Fund has recognized in recent years that one cannot separate issues of economic growth and stability on one hand and equality on the other. Indeed, there is a strong case for considering inequality and an inability to sustain economic growth as two sides of the same coin. Central to the...

The inefficiency of the Italian judicial system has contributed to reduced investments, slow growth and a difficult business environment. The enforcement of civil and commercial claims suffers from excessive delays in court proceedings, resulting in a very large number of pending cases. The...

Using a novel empirical approach and an extensive dataset developed by the Fiscal Affairs Department of the IMF, we find no evidence of any particular debt threshold above which medium-term growth prospects are dramatically compromised. Furthermore, we find the debt trajectory can be as...

Korea’s rapid growth has slowed in recent years, suggesting lower potential growth. This paper uses an array of techniques, including statistical filters, a multivariate model and the production function, to estimate Korea’s potential growth. The main finding is that trend growth has fallen...

This paper studies the short and longer-term impact of IMF engagement in Low-Income Countries (LICs) over nearly three decades. In contrast to earlier studies, we focus on a sample composed exclusively of LICs and disentangle the different effects of IMF longer-term engagement and short-term...

Rwanda is a unique case among its Sub-Saharan African peers in that it has already undergone a large scaling-up of public investment. The Rwandan government has made clear its desire to lower its reliance on foreign aid while still maintaining high public investment levels. We use the model of...

Five years after the onset of the global financial crisis, Europe’s economy is still fragile. Notwithstanding recent positive signs amid calmer financial markets, medium-term growth is likely to remain frail owing to continuing weaknesses and vulnerabilities at the country level and in the...