Empirically, a higher frequency of lightning strikes is associated with slower growth in labor productivity across the 48 contiguous U.S. states after 1990; before 1990, there is no correlation between growth and lightning. Other climate variables (e.g., temperature, rainfall, and tornadoes) do not...

We advance the hypothesis that cultural values such as high work ethics and thrift, “the Protestant ethic” according to Max Weber, may have been diffused long before the Reformation, thereby importantly affecting the pre-industrial growth record. The source of pre-Reformation Protestant...

We hypothesize that cultural appreciation of hard work and thrift, the "Protestant ethic" according to Max Weber, had a pre-Reformation origin. The proximate source of these values was, according to the proposed theory, the Catholic Order of Cistercians. In support, we document that the...

We hypothesize that cultural appreciation of hard work and thrift,the Protestant ethic according to Max Weber,had a pre-Reformation origin.The proximate source of these values was,according to the proposed theory,the Catholic Order of Cistercians.In support,we first document an impact from the...

A number of empirical studies have investigated the hypothesis that cross-border flows of goods (international trade) and capital (FDI) lead to international technology diffusion. The contribution of the present paper consists in examining an as yet neglected vehicle for technology diffusion:...

This paper estimates the total effect of power outages on economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa over the period 1995–2007. We pay close attention both to potential errors of measurement of African economic growth and to the endogeneity of outages. As suggested by Henderson et al. (American...

This paper examines Vietnam’s experience with bilateral trade agreements and compares subsequent outcomes with predictions from existing computable general equilibrium (CGE) models. Those model based assessments have greatly underestimated the impact of past agreements. Tariff reform is not...