World Bank

About: World Bank is a other organization based out in Washington D.C., District of Columbia, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poverty. The organization has 7813 authors who have published 21594 publications receiving 1198361 citations. The organization is also known as: World Bank, WB & The World Bank.

How Important is Selection? Experimental vs. Non-Experimental Measures of the Income Gains from Migration

Abstract: Measuring the gain in income from migration is complicated by non-random selection of migrants from the general population, making it hard to obtain an appropriate comparison group of non-migrants. This paper uses a migrant lottery to overcome this problem, providing an experimental measure of the income gains from migration. New Zealand allows a quota of Tongans to immigrate each year with a lottery used to choose amongst the excess number of applicants. A unique survey conducted by the authors in these two countries allows experimental estimates of the income gains from migration to be obtained by comparing the incomes of migrants to those who applied to migrate, but whose names were not drawn in the lottery, after allowing for the effect of noncompliance among some of those whose names were drawn. We also conducted a survey of individuals who did not apply for the lottery. Comparing this non-applicant group to the migrants enables assessment of the degree to which non-experimental methods can provide an unbiased estimate of the income gains from migration. We find evidence of migrants being positively selected in terms of both observed and unobserved skills. As a result, non-experimental methods are found to overstate the gains from migration, by 9 to 82 percent. A good instrumental variable works best, while difference-in-differences and bias-adjusted propensity-score matching also perform comparatively well.

Contract-Intensive Money: Contract Enforcement, Property Rights, and Economic Performance

Abstract: We introduce a new, easily accessed and objective measure of the enforceability of contracts and the security of property rights. This measure, called “contract-intensive money” or CIM, is based on citizens’ decisions regarding the form in which they choose to hold their financial assets. Country case studies show that CIM varies over time in response to political events in ways predicted by our arguments. We also show that CIM is positively related to investment and growth rates, and to the relative size of contract-dependent sectors of the economy.

Opportunities and Challenges in Antiparasitic Drug Discovery

Abstract: New antiparasitic drugs are urgently needed to treat and control diseases such as malaria, leishmaniasis, sleeping sickness and filariasis, which affect millions of people each year. However, because the majority of those infected live in countries in which the prospects of any financial return on investment are too low to support market-driven drug discovery and development, alternative approaches are needed. In this article, challenges and opportunities for antiparasitic drug discovery are considered, highlighting some of the progress that has been made in recent years, partly through scientific advances, but also by more effective partnership between the public and private sectors.

Small vs. Young Firms across the World : Contribution to Employment, Job Creation, and Growth

Abstract: This paper investigates the contribution of small firms to employment, job creation, and growth in developing countries. While small firms (< 20 employees) have the smallest share of aggregate employment, the SME sector's (<100 employees) contribution is comparable to that of large firms. Small firms have the largest shares of job creation, and highest sales growth and employment growth, even after controlling for firm age. Large firms, however, have higher productivity growth. Conditional on size, young firms are the fastest growing and large mature firms have the largest employment shares but small young firms have higher job creation rates.