Two otherwise identical firms that enter the same market in different months, one in January and one in December, will report dramatically different annual sales for the first calendar year of operations. This partial year effect in annual data leads to downward biased observations of the level...

As globalization progresses and investment is mobile, it is ever more important for policy makers to understand drivers of growth and exports at the micro-level: Which products are being produced and exported? Which firms populate the domestic economy? Are they successful in exporting? How are...

Using newly collected survey data on direct supplier-multinational linkages in Chile, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, Swaziland, and Vietnam, this paper first evaluates whether foreign investors differ from domestic producers in terms of their potential to generate positive spillovers for...

The Indonesian manufacturing sector experienced a 'lost decade' in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis. While many believe that the sector is now in inexorable decline, this note argues that there may be a 'second chance' for export manufacturing, given Indonesia's relative cost...

The failure of trade economists to anticipate the extreme drop in trade post Lehman Brothers bankruptcy suggests that the behavior of trade in exceptional circumstances may still be poorly understood. This paper explores whether uncertainty shocks have explanatory power for movements in trade....

Using a cross-section of more than 38,000 manufacturing and 24,000 services firms in 105 low- and middle-income countries from the World Bank's Enterprise Surveys, this chapter assesses whether there are productivity spillovers from services to manufacturing firms located in the same subnational...