Why do growth rates differ? This paper surveys the recent empirical literature on economic growth, starting with a discussion of stylized facts, data problems, and statistical methods. Six research questions are emphasized, drawing on growth and convergence research. In answering these questions, the paper argues that efficiency has grown at different rates across countries, casting doubt on neoclassical models in which technology is a public good. The latter half of the paper rounds up a variety of findings before providing answers to all six questions, including a short summary of how differences in growth rates arise.

The New Growth Evidence

The East Asian miracle: Economic growth and public policy: By the World Bank. (New York: Oxford University Press for the World Bank, 1993. 389 pp. $19.95, paper.)

We create a new index that measures the extent of openness in capital account transactions. Despite the abundance of literature and policy analyses regarding the effect of financial liberalization, the debate is far from settled. One of the reasons for that outcome is the lack of proper ways of measuring the extent of the openness in cross-border financial transactions. We seek to remedy this deficiency by creating an index aimed at measuring the extensity of capital controls based on the information from the IMF's Annual Report on Exchange Arrangements and Exchange Restrictions (AREAER). This paper details how we construct the data and where our index stands in relation to the extant literature. Given the intricacy of capital controls policies and regulations, the exercise of quantifying the extent of financial openness remains a challenging task. Nonetheless, our index makes a substantial contribution in terms of its coverage of countries and time period; the data are available for 181 countrie...

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A New Measure of Financial Openness

The authors examine the empirical evidence on currency crises and propose a specific early-warning system. This system involves monitoring the evolution of several indicators that tend to exhibit unusual behavior in the periods preceding a crisis. An indicator exceeding a certain threshold value should be interpreted as a warning"signal"that a currency crisis may take place within the following 24 months. The threshold values are calculated to strike a balance between the risk of having many false signals and the risk of missing many crises. Within this approach, the variables with the best track record include exports, deviations of the real exchange rate from trend, the ratio of broad money to gross international reserves, output, and equity prices. The evidence does not support some of the other indicators that were considered, including imports, bank deposits,the difference between foreign and domestic real deposit interest rates, and the ratio of lending to deposit interest rates.

/pdf/leading-indicators-of-currency-crises-13twwv9h9l.pdf

Leading Indicators of Currency Crises

This paper examines the empirical evidence on currency crises and proposes a specific early warning system. This system involves monitoring the evolution of several indicators that tend to exhibit an unusual behavior in the periods preceding a crisis. When an indicator exceeds a certain threshold value, this is interpreted as a warning "signal" that a currency crisis may take place within the following 24 months. The variables that have the best track record within this approach include exports, deviations of the real exchange rate from trend, the ratio of broad money to gross international reserves, output, and equity prices.

/pdf/leading-indicators-of-currency-crises-uri2v2azuu.pdf

Does a country‘s long-term growth depend on what happensin countries that are nearby? Such linkages could occur for avariety of reasons, including demand and technology spillovers.We present a series of tests to determine the existence of suchrelationships and the forms that they might take. We find thata country‘s growth rate is closely related to that of nearbycountries and show that this correlation reflects more than theexistence of common shocks. Trade alone does not appear responsiblefor these linkages either. In addition, we find that being neara large market contributes to growth.

/pdf/location-and-the-growth-of-nations-2lb3cv69i0.pdf

Location and the Growth of Nations

In recent years, some central banks in Latin America and other emerging market regions have used reserve requirements to pursue monetary or financial stability goals. In the past decade, they have raised reserve requirements in the expansion phase of the cycle to tighten monetary conditions without attracting capital inflows. After the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, they lowered them sharply, helping to restore market functioning. In some cases, the use of reserve requirements can complement the policy rate in the conduct of monetary policy. However, there are trade-offs in the use of this instrument.

The use of reserve requirements as a policy instrument in Latin America

The financial impact of the global crisis on Latin America has in some respects been less severe than in previous crises. This reflects in part the development of domestic bond markets and improved net balance sheet positions of the economies, which for a period have allowed gross capital inflow reversals to be partially offset by reductions in gross capital outflows. In addition, policy responses have helped to ease both external and domestic financial conditions. Nevertheless, considerable risks remain due to the ongoing economic downturn.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID1513216_code456443.pdf?abstractid=1513216&mirid=1

The global crisis and Latin America: financial impact and policy responses

Extreme learning machines for soybean classification in remote sensing hyperspectral images

The financial impact of the global crisis on Latin America has in some respects been less severe than in previous crises. This reflects in part the development of domestic bond markets and improved net balance sheet positions of the economies, which have allowed gross capital inflow reversals to be partially offset by reductions in gross capital outflows. In addition, policy responses have helped to ease both external and domestic financial conditions. Nevertheless, considerable risks remain due to the ongoing economic downturn.

Ramon Moreno

Papers

Location and the Growth of Nations

The use of reserve requirements as a policy instrument in Latin America

The global crisis and Latin America: financial impact and policy responses

Extreme learning machines for soybean classification in remote sensing hyperspectral images

The global crisis and Latin America: financial impact and policy responses