East Asian economies have experienced rapid growth over three decades, with relatively low levels of income inequality, and appear to have also achieved reductions in income inequality. We argue that policies that reduced poverty and income inequalities, such as emphasizing high-quality basic...

We assess the dynamics behind the high net resource transfers by donors and creditors to Sub-Saharan African countries. Analyzing the determinants of overall net transfers for a panel of 37 recipient countries in 1978--98, we find that country policies mattered little. Donors--especially...

Education is one of the great challenges of development. This paper outlines the likely effects of the AIDS pandemic in Africa on the continent's ability to produce education and use it effectively for growth and poverty reduction. Four channels are explored. First, a supply effect: the deaths...

We argue that survey-based median household consumption expenditure (or income) per capita be incorporated into standard development indicators, as a simple, robust, and durable indicator of typical individual material well-being in a country. Using household survey data available for low- and...

Substantial progress in the fight against extreme poverty was made in the last two decades. But the slowdown in global economic growth and significant increases in income inequality in many developed and developing countries raise serious concerns about the continuation of this trend into the...

Fourteen essays by experienced political leaders, researchers and scholars examine the political economy and international relations of the Caribbean. Strategies for sustainable development include proposals to link productive structures among private sectors and increase institutional flexibility.

Escaping the Poverty Trap proposes early childhood investment policies that could decisively change the prospects for the next generation of the region's poor. Contributors include Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen and Gro Harlem Brundtland, former director-general of the World Health Organization. In...

The effect of demography on economic performance has been the subject of intense debate in economics for nearly two centuries. In recent years opinion has swung between the Malthusian views of Coale and Hoover, and the cornucopian views of Julian Simon. Unfortunately, until recently, data were...

In this paper, four categories of existing resource-mobilization options are examined, including (1) transportation levies; (2) currency and financial transaction taxes; (3) capitalization of IMF Special Drawing Rights (SDRs); and (4) the sale, mobilization, or capitalization of IMF gold....