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The book seeks to link theoretical debates on the relevance of trust in economic outcomes with the current arguments about the origins and lessons of the subprime crisis. By what mechanisms does trust influence economic outcomes? Under what conditions do these mechanisms prevail? How do debates about trust help our understanding of the subprime crisis in the European Union? By integrating insights from Post-Keynesian, Austrian and new institutional economics, the central proposition of the analysis is that the presence or absence of institutional trust creates virtuous and vicious cycles in law-abiding, which critically influence the possibility for economic agents to have realistic long-term plans.
This new annual publication from the World Bank Group provides an overview and assessment of financial sector development around the world, with particular attention on medium- and low-income countries.
Kristen Ghodsee and Mitchell A. Orenstein blend empirical data with lived experiences to produce a robust picture of who won and who lost in post-communist transition, contextualizing the rise of populism in Eastern Europe. After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, more than 400 million people suddenly found themselves in a new reality, a dramatic transition from state socialist and centrally planned workers' states to liberal democracy (in most cases) and free markets. Thirty years later, postsocialist citizens remain sharply divided on the legacies of transition. Was it a success that produced great progress after a short recession, or a socio-economic catastrophe foisted on the East by W...
United Arab Emirates: Selected Issues
The Gulf Cooperation Council countries have successfully weathered recent turbulence in the Middle East, and their economic prospects remain favorable. Nonhydrocarbon activity has been strong amid reform implementation, although overall growth has decelerated due to cuts in oil production. The growth outlook is positive, as the envisaged easing of oil production cuts and natural gas expansion spur the recovery in the hydrocarbon sector, while the nonhydrocarbon economy continues to expand. External buffers remain comfortable despite current account balances having narrowed. Risks around the outlook are broadly balanced in the near term. More challenging medium-term risks, especially in the context of geoeconomic fragmentation and climate change, call for action on policy priorities to continue to strengthen the private sector and to diversify the economy.
This paper presents an overview of exposures in the balance sheets of central banks, banks, and other depository institutions during the past decade, with emphasis on asset growth and currency composition. It exploits the IMF’s SRF-based monetary data to show: (i) there was a widely observed buildup of assets prior to the global financial crisis, but there has been no significant reduction in its wake; (ii) the foreign currency composition of the balance sheets of banks and other depository institutions remained remarkably constant in spite of the crisis, significant changes in the composition of balance sheets, and globalization, and does not seem to have been significantly influenced by the behavior of exchange rates; and (iii) exposure to households increased prior to the crisis, but this increased risk was offset by increased capitalization.
This paper highlights the fact that to address the challenge of declining working age population, policies should not only aim to support fertility, but also to increase labor force participation rate, to improve labor allocation across sectors and to encourage net immigration. However, with some recent measures going in the opposite direction, even such mitigating policies may not fully offset the demographic headwinds. Poland faces profound demographic changes. The decline of fertility rate and growing life expectancy, mostly driven by longevity of older cohorts, will significantly change the demographic landscape. Demographics may soon pose a barrier for growth. The historical expansion of working age population appears to have been only partly utilized to boost potential growth, with increased unemployment and declined labor force participation rates dampening potential gains. Net migration was also a drag on the labor supply in the past, but this has changed recently. In addition to a steady outflow of permanent migrants, there was a sharp pickup in temporary migration after EU accession.
The IMF is charged by its Articles of Agreement and a 1977 Executive Board Decision to exercise surveillance over the international monetary system and members’ exchange rate policies. The overriding question addressed by this evaluation is whether, over the 1999–2005 period, the IMF fulfilled this core responsibility. The main finding is that the IMF was simply not as effective as it needs to be in both its analysis and advice and in its dialogue with member countries. The evidence supporting this conclusion, along with other key findings, is set out in this report. The report also presents a detailed set of recommendations that could go a long way in improving the quality and effectiveness of IMF surveillance.
Cambodia is poised to join a new generation of Asian frontier economies transitioning from low-income to emerging-market. But the path to greater and more shared prosperity requires a solid foundation of sound macroeconomic policies, enabling new growth drivers, tackling a highly dollarized and fragmented financial system, and creating more fiscal policy space to help meet Cambodia’s vast development needs. This book first takes a closer look at the key economic challenges Cambodia faces at the current juncture, highlighting Cambodia’s structural and financial constraints to growth as well as shifting vulnerabilities as Asia rebalances. It then lays out how a strategy of fiscal and financial sector policies, from creating a fairer and more buoyant tax system to modernizing financial instruments, markets and supervision, can help mobilize the resources and tools needed for one of Asia’s youngest and fastest-growing populations to enjoy more self-sustaining and inclusive growth.
Post-crisis dynamics show a shrinkage in the overall amount of crossborder bank lending, which has been interpreted in the literature as a retreat in financial globalization. In this paper, we argue that aggregate figures are not sufficient to support such a claim in terms of the overall structure of the global banking network. Based on a systematic approach to measuring, mapping and analyzing financial interconnectedness among countries using network theory, we show that, despite the decline in aggregate lending volumes, the structure of the network has developed increased connections in some dimensions. Some parts of the network are currently more interlinked regionally than before the cri...