We use bank level data to study the efficiency of banks in Sub-Saharan African middle-income countries and provide possible explanations for the difference in the efficiency levels of banks. We find that banks, on average, could save 20-30 percent of their total costs if they were operating...

Current estimates of global poverty vary substantially across studies. In this paper we undertake a novel sensitivity analysis to highlight the importance of methodological choices in estimating global poverty. We measure global poverty using different data sources, parametric and nonparametric...

We combine some newly developed panel co-integration techniques and common factor analysis to analyze the behavior of the real exchange rate (RER) in a sample of 64 developing countries. We study the dynamic of the RER with its economic fundamentals: productivity, the terms of trade, openness,...

A well-functioning public expenditure management (PEM) system is considered a critical pillar of government efficiency, on par with a low-distortion tax system and efficient tax administration. The paper discusses PEM systems in developing countries using an analytical framework based on...

Using panel data from 120 developing countries from 1975 to 2000, this paper explores the direct and indirect channels linking social spending, human capital, and growth in a system of equations. The paper finds that both education and health spending have a positive and significant direct...

This paper examines the effects of IMF financial assistance on economic governance in developing countries, based on panel data analyses of perceived governance indicators. It uses a two-stage approach to address possible endogeneity issues. The results show that successful implementation of IMF...

The literature on aid effectiveness has focused more on recipient policies than the determinants of aid allocation yet a consistent result is that political allies obtain more aid from donors than non-allies. This paper shows that aid allocated to political allies is ineffective for growth,...

This paper models the impact on economic growth of HIV/AIDS when the epidemic is in a mature phase, in contrast with previous studies focused on periods of expansion, as in African countries. Simulations for Honduras, the epicenter of the epidemic in Central America, show that AIDS is not likely...

This paper evaluates the impact of two public programs, FONTEC and FONDEF, aimed at fostering innovation in Chilean firms. With the cooperation of several public agencies, participants and non-participants in these programs during the period 1995-2000 were identified from a large panel of firms...

Los Institutos Tecnológicos Públicos (ITPs) en América Latina han sufrido un deterioro significativo de sus capacidades en las últimas décadas. En la mayoría de los países están a la deriva, sin que exista una visión y misión claramente establecidas, contribuyendo a su pérdida de foco...