The evolving geopolitical landscape has placed South Africa at a crossroads, torn between its historical ties to the West and its growing relationships with BRICS+ nations, particularly China and Russia. The country's recent political shift, marked by the African National Congress (ANC) losing...

Subnational data on household welfare helps identify and monitor locations with high concentration of poverty and inequality, resulting in more efficient policy interventions. Yet, very few global databases on poverty and inequality exist at the subnational level. Using the World Bank's Global...

We propose a novel dynamic panel estimator. Different from the commonly used difference and system GMM, our proposed estimator requires only one of the crosssectional dimension (N) or the time dimension (T) to grow large to be asymptotically unbiased. This improves reliability in panels with...

This short note looks at the link between churning of exporters and dynamics of exports using data from the World Bank Exporter Dynamics Database from 69 countries primarily for the period between 2003 and 2010. In line with Schumpetarian theory of creative destruction we report that a higher...

When structural labor supply models are unavailable or impractical, the paper proposes a practical method for incorporating behavioral responses into static taxbenefit microsimulation models. Using elasticity estimates from the literature, the proposed external evidence procedure offers a...

This paper develops a novel measure of state fragility: the probability of state failure. We define state failure as the inability to perform core functions and operationalize it through observable breakdowns- conflict, territorial control, institutional deficiency, and public service...

In Brazil and around the world, the recent increase in the number of temporary teachers in public school systems is remarkable, but its impact on the quality of education remains unknown. Based on Brazilian evidence - including data from the School Census, (basic education development index...

• Europe must urgently strengthen its defence capabilities and secure strategic autonomy to avoid vulnerability to external pressures. • The proposal outlines a European Future of Defence Architecture focusing on next generation military technologies and strategic enablers (like AI, cyber,...

In this study, we explore the relationship between town size and subjective well-being (SWB) in Latin America. We utilize data from the Latinobarómetro survey from 2005 to 2015, employing multilevel modeling to analyze individual responses to life satisfaction as an indicator of SWB. We refine...

Clemens et al. (2018) examine the impact of the exclusion of Mexican immigrant workers, known as braceros, from US agricultural labour markets in the 1960s. The explicit goal of this policy was to boost wages and/or employment for local agricultural workers by decreasing labour supply. The...