The COVID-19 pandemic is posing unprecedented challenges, making it difficult for policy makers to design appropriate policies. In this context, real-time information can play a most valuable role for policy makers in developing countries, particularly since official economic indicators, such as...

Since the Great Depression of the 1930s, and through the more recent Asian Crisis of 1997 and Great Recession of 2008/09, governments have experimented with Keynesian style fiscal stimulus to support employment and accelerate economic recovery. The effectiveness of these policies depends on the...