Inappropriate regulation can influence productivity performance by affecting incentives to invest and adopt new technologies, as well as by directly curbing competitive pressures. Results of a labor productivity growth model for European countries suggest that improving the regulatory...

Using enterprise data for the economies of Central and Eastern Europe and the CIS, this study examines the effects of corruption on productivity. Corruption is narrowly defined as the occurrence of informal payments to government officials to ease the day-to-day operation of firms. The effects...

Less restrictive product market policies are crucial in promoting convergence to higher levels of GDP per capita. This paper benchmarks product market policies in Bulgaria to those of OECD countries by estimating OECD indicators of Product Market Regulation (PMR). The PMR indicators allow a...

This report is about the twelve countries of the former Soviet Union (Eurasia). About 85 percent of the region’s economic output is in six resource-rich economies. Today, 85 percent of Eurasia’s 280 million people are no longer poor. But academics who study resource-based economies debate...

Using enterprise data for the economies of Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, this study examines the effects of corruption on productivity. Corruption is defined as a "bribe tax" and is compared with another form of institutional inefficiency, which is often...

Romania's European Union accession in 2007 has resulted in a substantial reduction of the formal barriers to integration with the European Union Single Market. This study takes stock of the progress by benchmarking product market policies in Romania to those of European Union countries, as...

This paper examines whether natural resource dependence has a negative influence on various indicators of institutional quality when controlling for the potential effects of other geographic, economic and cultural initial conditions. Analysis of a panel of countries from 1996 to 2010 indicates...

Inappropriate regulation can influence productivity performance by affecting incentives to invest and adopt new technologies, as well as by directly curbing competitive pressures. Results of a labor productivity growth model for European Union countries suggest that improving the regulatory...