This paper estimates the impact of digital infrastructure on economic growth and its sources. The analysis uses system generalized method of moments and finds evidence of a causal impact from the digital infrastructure variables to economic growth, its sources, income inequality, and poverty....

This paper examines systematically the growth effects of trade integration in Sub-Saharan Africa. It complements and improves upon the empirical literature in two aspects: first, it jointly estimates the impact of different dimensions of trade integration, namely, trade volumes, export/trade...

This paper examines the growth effects of different dimensions of international trade integration -- notably, volume, diversification, and natural resource dependence -- in Sub-Saharan Africa. First, the paper documents the recent trends in these foreign trade dimensions for the region and the...

Infrastructure is viewed as a crucial ingredient to foster growth and productivity. Amid the post -- global financial crisis slowdown, Sub-Saharan Africa is in dire need to continue the growth momentum it experienced during the period of the Africa Rising narrative. An emerging consensus in the...

After much debate, many academic circles have concluded that under the right circumstances, infrastructure stocks may be a promoter for growth. This paper benchmarks Mexico’s infrastructure quantity stocks and identifies Mexico’s infrastructure bottlenecks in regard to 94 countries. With a...

Advanced and emerging market economies have rapidly integrated into international capital markets and this growing globalization of financial markets has led to some important changes in the patterns of saving and investment across the world. The main goal of this paper is to test whether the...

An adequate supply of infrastructure services has long been viewed by both academics and policy makers as a key ingredient for economic development. Over the past quarter-century, the retrenchment of Latin America's public sector from its dominant position in the provision of infrastructure, and...

Using the dating algorithm by Harding and Pagan (2002) on a quarterly database for 23 emerging market economies (EMEs) and 12 developed countries over the period 1980.Q1 - 2006.Q2, the authors proceed to characterize and compare the business cycle features of these two groups. They first find...

This paper investigates how government interventions into banking systems such as blanket guarantees, liquidity support, recapitalizations, and nationalizations affect banking competition. This debate is important because the pricing of banking products has implications for borrower and...

Africa's Pulse is a biannual publication containing an analysis of the near-term macroeconomic outlook forthe region. Each issue also includes a section focusing upon a topic that represents a particular developmentchallenge for the continent. It is produced by the Office of the Chief Economist...