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Effects of the Business Cycle on Social Indicators in Latin America and the Caribbean
After mediocre growth in 2018 of 0.7 percent. LAC is expected to perform only marginally better in 2019 (growth of 0.9 percent) followed by a much more solid growth of 2.1 percent in 2020. LAC will face both internal and external challenges during 2019. On the domestic front. the recession in Argentina; a slower than expected recovery in Brazil from the 2014-2015 recession, anemic growth in Mexico. and the continued deterioration of Venezuela. present the biggest challenges. On the external front. the sharp drop in net capital inflows to the region since early 2018 and the monetary policy normalization in the United States stand among the greatest perils. Furthermore, the recent increase in poverty in Brazil because of the recession points to the large effects that the business cycle may have on poverty. The core of this report argues that social indicators that are very sensitive to the business cycle may yield a highly misleading picture of permanent social gains in the region.
Renewing with Growth
Latin America and the Caribbean suffered the largest death toll from Covid†?19 across developing regions and the sharpest decline in economic activity. With fewer school days and lower employment rates, with higher public debt and more firms under stress, the effects could be long†?lasting. The crisis also triggered large†?scale economic restructuring, with productivity higher in the expanding than in the contracting sectors. Accelerated digitization could instill dynamism in finance, trade and labor markets, but it may amplify inequality within and across the countries in the region. Technology could transform the energy sector as well. Latin America and the Caribbean has the cleanest and potentially cheapest electricity generation matrix of all developing regions. But its electricity is the most expensive, due mainly to inefficiencies. Distributed generation within countries and electricity trade across countries, could make energy greener and cheaper, provided that the pricing is right.
The Promise of Integration
The Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region has proved to be relatively resilient in the face of increased debt stress, stubborn inflation, and uncertainty arising from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Income and employment have largely recovered from the pandemic, poverty has receded, and markets remain guardedly optimistic about the near future. However, global uncertainty is rising, including a recent wave of bank failures in the US and Europe. Strengthening resilience, both on the health and macroeconomic fronts, will be paramount. Progress remains pending in both vaccination coverage and health system preparedness, while the institutionality of macroeconomic policy in some countrie...
New Approaches to Closing the Fiscal Gap
As the COVID†?19 crisis recedes, Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) is back to work and looking forward. Reported deaths related to the pandemic are low and have plausibly converged to global levels. Yet low vaccination rates in some countries leave them vulnerable to new variants. In most countries, gross domestic product (GDP) and employment have fully recovered their 2019 levels, although forecasted growth rates might be said to be “resiliently mediocre†?: banking systems appear sound, and rising debt burdens are manageable so far, but growth is not expected to exceed the low levels of the 2010 decade. Poverty in terms of income (monetary poverty) has largely receded with the eco...
How to Achieve Inclusive Growth
This authoritative book explains the sources and scale of current economic challenges and proposes solutions to craft a brighter future by building a sustainable, green, and inclusive society in the years ahead.
Managing for Learning
How can countries make sustainable gains in student learning at scale? This is a pressing question for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)--and the developing world more broadly--as countries seek to build human capital to drive sustainable growth. Significant progress in access has expanded coverage such that nearly all children in the region attend primary school, but many do not gain basic skills and drop out before completing secondary school, in part due to low-quality service delivery. The preponderance of evidence shows that it is learning--and not schooling in and of itself--that contributes to individual earnings, economic growth, and reduced inequality. For LAC in particular, low...
Is the Public Investment Multiplier Higher in Developing Countries? An Empirical Exploration
Over the last decade, empirical studies analyzing macroeconomic conditions that may affect the size of government spending multipliers have flourished. Yet, in spite of their obvious public policy importance, little is known about public investment multipliers. In particular, the clear theoretical implication that public investment multipliers should be higher (lower) the lower (higher) is the initial stock of public capital has not, to the best of our knowledge, been tested. This paper tackles this empirical challenge and finds robust evidence in favor of the above hypothesis: countries with a low initial stock of public capital (as a proportion of GDP) have significantly higher public investment multipliers than countries with a high initial stock of public capital. This key finding seems robust to the sample (European countries, U.S. states, and Argentine provinces) and to the identification method (Blanchard-Perotti, forecast errors, and instrumental variables). Our results thus suggest that public investment in developing countries would carry high returns.
Trade Integration as a Pathway to Development?
After a period of rapid economic growth associated with high commodity prices, the Latin America and Caribbean region has again entered a phase of lackluster performance. Overall this slowdown seems more self-inflicted than imported, and the outlook for the region is not encouraging either. A tepid export response constrains the prospect of growing through external demand whereas limited fiscal space leaves little room to stimulate domestic demand. The outlook could deteriorate further if the international environment became less conducive. This report explores whether inward-looking development strategies could be one of the reasons for slow growth in Latin America and the Caribbean. Trade barriers are higher than in other developing regions, and while numerous preferential trade agreements have been signed, many of them are intra-regional. The report shows that South-North agreements are associated with increases in economic complexity and faster economic growth than South-South agreements. It illustrates the point by assessing the economic, social, spatial and environmental impacts of two major: South-North agreements signed over the last year.
Wired
Latin America and the Caribbean continues to face adverse global headwinds: high interest rates, modest G-7 growth, soft commodity prices and uncertain prospects in China will all depress growth. Well-grounded policy responses have led to largely recovering employment and income losses from the pandemic and falling rates of inflation. However, the region faces the mutually reinforcing triple challenges of low growth, limited fiscal space, and citizen dissatisfaction. Expanding digital connectivity offers a possibility to make progress on all three fronts. To maximize the social benefits of connectivity as well as to ensure that it does not exacerbate spatial, educational, gender or racial inequalities, three challenges are important to address: first, expanding coverage to the remaining unconnected areas as well as improving the quality of service; second, increasing the productive use of existing infrastructure, and; third, as with any other infrastructure "hardware," investments in "software" - such as digital and traditional skills, managerial capabilities, supportive regulatory frameworks, and deeper financial markets are critical.
The Evolving Geography of Productivity and Employment
The Evolving Geography of Productivity and Employment: Ideas for Inclusive Growth through a Territorial Lens in Latin America and the Caribbean employs a territorial lens to understand the persistently low economic growth rates in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Using new data and methods, it shows that deindustrialization, distance, and divisions offer intertwined explanations for an urban productivity paradox in the LAC region: its highly dense cities should be among the world’s most productive, yet they are not. LAC cities have been held back by lack of dynamism, poor connectivity, and divisions into disconnected poor and affluent neighborhoods. Deindustrialization has shifted ur...
