This note outlines a scheme for mobilizing financing to help developing countries confront the challenges posed by climate change. The idea is to create a “Green Fund” with the capacity to raise resources on a scale commensurate with the Copenhagen Accord ($100 billion a year by 2020). By...

This paper presents a new model based on the loan-pushing model by Basu (1991) to show how a domestic debt crisis can occur in a low-income country following donor herding. The model focuses on the rational herding behavior of donors due to payoff and information externalities. Although there...

We examine the effects of public sector borrowing from the domestic banking system on financial development in middle-income countries. While these countries'' external debt has been falling, the share of bank credit absorbed by the public sector has been rising rapidly. We argue that this runs...

The paper analyzes how the UNDP, the World Bank, and the IMF classify countries based on their level of development. These systems are found lacking in clarity with regard to their underlying rationale. The paper argues that a country classification system based on a transparent, data-driven...

Despite substantial debt relief to HIPC Initiative completion point countries, long-term debt sustainability remains a challenge. This paper examines a number of structural factors affecting external debt sustainability. It shows that in HIPC completion point countries (i) the export base...

This paper investigates the short-run effects of the 2007-09 global financial crisis on growth in (mainly non-fuel exporting) low-income countries (LICs). Four conclusions stand out. First, for many individual LICs, 2009 was not extraordinarily calamitous; however, aggregate LIC output declined...

This handbook, edited by Ke-young Chu and Richard Hemming, offers guidance to officials formulating public policy recommendations, so that the aggregate level of public spending conforms with the economy's overall resource capacity. The handbook looks at the impact of public spending on the...

Taxation, like politics, is the art of the possible--yet most public finance texts ignore the critical role played by tax administration in restoring macroeconomic balance and promoting equity and efficiency. This volume, edited by Richard M. Bird and Milka Casanegra de Jantscher, fills a gap in...

IMF-supported adjustment programs aim to restore economic growth, while bringing about a sustainable balance of payments position. Achievement of these goals requires coordinated use of a variety of policy meansures, including monetary and fiscal, exchange rate, external debt management, and...

While economists continue to debate whether particular economic policies, such as those referred to in Willliamson’s (1993) “Washington Consensus,” can spur growth in developing countries, this paper demonstrates that it is combinations of policies that are more critical for growth. Policy...