Mexico's creation and use of safeguard and antidumping processes to advance its liberalization illustrate three key points: (1) The country was able to use the instruments without losing political control. In a period of crisis that threatened congressional approval of critical steps in the...

Microfinance institutions have proved the possibility of providing reliable banking services to poor customers. Their second aim is to do so in a commercially-viable way. This paper analyzes the tensions and opportunities of microfinance as it embraces the market, drawing on a data set that...

The typical financial sector reform package involves policy changes to increase the power of centralized decision making in some areas and to reduce it in others. For regulation and supervision, reforms seek strengthened information systems, stronger and more detailed regulations, and closer...

This study performs an ex-post analysis of the effects of the trade liberalization in Mexico between 1989 and 2000, taking into account regional differences in the Mexican economy. The effects of trade liberalization are first translated into changes in regional prices and wages. Those estimates...

This paper contains abstracts of Policy Research Working Paper series, Numbers 1575-1589.

The World Bank has increasingly focused on firm-level surveys to build the data foundation needed for accurate policy analysis in developing and transition economies. The authors take stock of some recent Bank surveys, and discuss how to improve their results. Lessons on data issues, and...

Empirical analyses of annuities markets have been limited to a few industrial countries and restricted by data limitations. Chile provides excellent conditions for research on annuities because of the depth of its market and the availability of data. The authors use a panel of life insurance...

The authors explore the relation between the establishment of a regulatory agency and the performance of the electricity sector. The authors exploit a unique dataset comprising firm-level information on a representative sample of 220 electric utilities from 51 development and transition...

Vietnam's rapid economic growth in the 1990s greatly increased the incomes of Vietnamese households, which led to a dramatic decline in poverty. Over the same period, child malnutrition rates in Vietnam, as measured by low height for age in children under 5, fell from 50 percent in 1992-93 to 34...

The authors review the historical relationship between the work of applied economists, and policymakers, and the institutions that came to characterize the commodity, and risk markets of the 1980s. These institutions were a response to the harmful consequences of commodity market volatility, and...