We document that trust in public institutions "and particularly trust in banks, business and government" has declined over recent years. U.S. time series evidence suggests that this partly reflects the pro-cyclical nature of trust in institutions. Cross-country comparisons reveal a clear legacy...

Political economy theories of financial development argue that in countries where a narrow elite controls political decisions, financial development may be obstructed to deny access to finance to potential competitors. We use panel data on developed and developing countries from 1975ndash;2000...

Prepared for The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, 2nd Edition, this essay examines the evolution of both institutions and economists' thinking on institutions during transition. Early in transition, institutions were virtually ignored in the majority of normative prescriptions, but were...

We document that trust in public institutions - and particularly trust in banks, business and government - has declined over recent years. U.S. time series evidence suggests that this partly reflects the pro-cyclical nature of trust in institutions. Cross-country comparisons reveal a clear...

Recent changes in the former communist countries have demonstrated the importance of a legal system for economic progress. A legal system defines property rights, allows for exchange of property rights, and protects property rights. Countries with a rule of law and well established property...

We document that trust in public institutions ﾖ and particularly trust in banks, business and government ﾖ has declined over recent years. U.S. time series evidence suggests that this partly reflects the pro-cyclical nature of trust in institutions. Cross-country comparisons reveal a clear...

Finance has become more a problem than a solution to what the world most wants: socially inclusive growth. It has become a source of crises that threaten the development of the real economy. It has escaped accountability to democratic institutions and often helped, instead, to influence and...

This study delves into the symmetric effects of governance on economic growth for the world’s ten largest economies, employing a model augmented with well-known growth, governance, and control predictors to inform model specification. Using panel and time-series techniques, both collectively...

This study examines the causal links between improvements in economic freedom and changes in GDP per capita of new EU members in transition in the period 2000-2009. The empirical results suggest significant causality running from changes in monetary and fiscal freedom, trade openness, regulation...