Hikes in U.S. interest rates in 1999-2000 have started to spill over to other economies' interest rates, which in many countries have risen to reflect the higher U.S. rates. Are countries with flexible exchange rates better able to isolate their domestic interest rates from this type of negative...

This paper investigates whether leading indicators can help explain the cross-country incidence of the 2008-09 financial crisis. Rather than looking for indicators with specific relevance to the current crisis, the selection of variables is driven by an extensive review of more than eighty...

We offer a framework to assign quantitative allocations of emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs), across countries, one budget period at a time. Under the two-part plan: China, India, and other developing countries accept targets at Business as Usual (BAU) in the coming budget period, the same...

It is striking how often countries with oil or other natural resource wealth have failed to grow more rapidly than those without. This is the phenomenon known as the Natural Resource Curse. The principle is not confined to individual anecdotes or case studies, but has been borne out in...

Government forecasts of GDP growth and budget balances are generally more over-optimistic than private sector forecasts. When official forecasts are especially optimistic relative to private forecasts ex ante, they are more likely also to be over-optimistic relative to realizations ex post. For...

We seek to contribute to the debate over globalization and the environment by asking: What is the effect of trade on a country's environment, for a given level of GDP? We take specific account of the endogeneity of trade, using exogenous geographic determinants of trade as instrumental...

Using a large sample of developing and industrialized economies during 1970-1999, this paper explores whether the choice of exchange rate regime affects the sensitivity of local interest rates to international interest rates. In most cases, we cannot reject full transmission of international...

The paper begins by arguing that globalization, which here means reductions in the remaining barriers to international trade, still has a long way to go. Next it briefly reviews the evidence on the economic benefits from globalization, followed by a consideration of the non-economic effects in...

The most obvious explanation for the large and widening US current account deficit is the high budget deficit and low national saving. But a variety of clever economists have come up with 8 other, more sanguine, explanations: (1) the siblings are not twins, (2) investment boom, (3) low US...

Might the dollar eventually follow the precedent of the pound and cede its status as leading international reserve currency? Unlike the last time this question was prominently discussed, ten years ago, there now exists a credible competitor: the euro. This paper econometrically estimates...