Micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) are recognized as crucial drivers of economic development, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. The advent of digital platforms, characterized by economies of scale and significant cross-network externalities in two-sided markets,...

Successful exporting countries are often seen as successful economies. This paper studies the role of new exporting entrepreneurs – defined as firms that became exporters – in determining export growth in a fast growing and export oriented middle-income country i.e., Costa Rica during...

The literature on the correlation between exports and economic development runs deep into the history of economic thought and permeates policy debates. This paper studies the microeconomic structure of export growth in Costa Rica, with special emphasis on the extensive margin of trade,...

This paper documents that senior plant managers in less-developed countries spend more time dealing with government rules and regulations than their counterparts in richer countries. These facts are interpreted through the lens of a span-of-control growth model, in which top managers run...

This paper investigates informal employment in Brazil's highly regulated labor market, focusing on the intensive margin of informality within formal firms. Using a comprehensive dataset of labor audits conducted from 1997 to 2012, we find that formal firms caught with informal workers face...

Can the Spanish government generate more tax revenue by making personal income taxes more progressive? To answer this question, we build a life-cycle economy with uninsurable labor productivity risk and endogenous labor supply. Individuals face progressive taxes on labor and capital incomes and...

In this paper, we use administrative data on tax returns to characterize the distributions of before- and after-tax income, tax liabilities and tax credits in Spain for individuals and households. We use the most recent available data, 2015 for individuals and 2013 for households, but also...