Consumption baskets vary across households and inflation rates vary across goods. As a result, standard consumer price index (CPI) inflation may provide a misleading measure of the inflation actually faced by poor households, more so the more unequal the distribution of aggregate consumption...

Using a large cross-country income distribution dataset spanning close to 800 country-year observations from industrial and developing countries, the authors show that the size distribution of per capita income is well approximated empirically by a lognormal density. The null hypothesis that per...

Recent theoretical literature has suggested a variety of mechanisms through which poverty may deter growth and become self-perpetuating. A few papers have searched for empirical regularities consistent with those mechanisms – such as aggregate non-convexities and convergence clubs. However, a...

Recent theoretical literature has suggested a variety of mechanisms through which poverty may deter growth and become self-perpetuating. A few papers have searched for empirical regularities consistent with those mechanisms - such as aggregate non-convexities and convergence clubs. However, a...

This paper presents a methodology for calculating bilateral equilibrium exchange rates for a panel of currencies in a way that guarantees global consistency. The methodology has three parts: a theoretical model that encompasses the balance of payments and the Balassa-Samuelson approaches to real...

Between 1990 and 2001 the Argentine peso appreciated by 80 percent in real terms, and its overvaluation has been singled out as one of the main suspects in the debate on the causes of the Argentina collapse of late 2001. Alberola, Lopez, and Serveacute;n assess the degree of real misalignment in...

This paper presents a methodology for the calculation of bilateral equilibrium exchange rates for a panel of currencies in a way that guarantees consistency at the global level. A theoretical model, which encompasses the balance of payments and the Balassa-Samuelson approaches to real exchange...

This paper attempts to measure the degree of misalignment of the euro - in particular against the dollar - by estimating equilibrium exchange rates for the euro and the rest of G-7 currencies. Building on the methodology of Alberola et al. (1999), we show that the stock of net foreign assets and...

This paper presents a methodology for the calculation of bilateral equilibrium exchange rates for a panel of currencies in a way that guarantees consistency at the global level. A theoretical model, which encompasses the balance of payments and the Balassa-Samuelson approaches to real exchange...