We employ the “social conditions of innovative enterprise” framework to analyze the key determinants of China’s development path from the economic reforms of 1978 to the present. First, we focus on how government investments in human capabilities and physical infrastructure provided...

This study is part of the broader barriers to entry project undertaken for the National Treasury and it assesses barriers to entry and expansion into the agro processing sector. It focuses on three agro-processing subsectors; poultry, milling and dairy. The paper draws on interviews conducted...

Employment growth is strongly predicted by smaller average establishment size, both across cities and across industries within cities, but there is little consensus on why this relationship exists. Traditional economic explanations emphasize factors that reduce entry costs or raise...

Regulations of product markets serve legitimate objectives but, when ill-designed, can impose unnecessary restrictions on competition, and therefore on business dynamism, productivity and ultimately well-being. A recent update of the OECD’s Product Market Regulation indicator for Costa Rica...

This study examines barriers to entry in the South African retail banking informed by Capitec's experiences as an entrant. In some ways Capitec's experience is exceptional. It surged ahead early attempts to bank the excluded from banks such as Ubank (former Teba Bank) and the Mzansi initiative....

The paper will assess certain outcomes in the implementation of competition policy in South Africa to address the exertion of market power unilaterally by large firms or through collusive arrangements. Through reviewing the theoretical framework and literature linking competition policy and...

Economic regulation, including competition policy, is not an end in itself but a means to an end, and must ultimately have a positive impact on the economy as a whole. However, this positive impact needs to be broad-based or inclusive, particularly in the context of South Africa given its legacy...

Economic regulation, including competition policy, is not an end in itself but a means to an end, and must ultimately have a positive impact on the economy as a whole. However, this positive impact needs to be broad-based or inclusive, particularly in the context of South Africa given its legacy...

We build a model of firm-level innovation, productivity growth and reallocation featuring endogenous entry and exit. A new and central economic force is the selection between high- and low-type firms, which differ in terms of their innovative capacity. We estimate the parameters of the model...

Historically South Africa has favoured incumbents/national champions over rivalry (competition) in the telecommunications sector. However, the importance of competition has become more apparent with each new development in the sector. Given the changes in this dynamic sector it is important to...