This paper investigates the role of fiscal guarantees in promoting infrastructure investment. Infrastructure is a critical driver of economic growth, but infrastructure entails significant up-front costs that yield benefits after a time lag. Investors hesitate to put their money down on private...

As the Eurozone crisis drags on, it is evident that a part of the problem lies in the architecture of debt and its liabilities within the Eurozone and, more generally, the European Union. This paper argues that a large part of the problem can be mitigated by permitting appropriately-structured...

Ponzis are among the most ubiquitous and least understood phenomena of economic life. They acquired a certain salience with the global financial crisis of 2008 and the crash of Bernie Madoff’s celebrated Ponzi scheme. This paper explains the structure of Ponzi schemes and goes on to argue that...

This paper analyzes the impact of banking crises on manufacturing exports exploiting the fact that sectors differ in their needs for external financing. Relying on data from 23 banking crises episodes involving both developed and developing countries during the period 1980-2000 the authors...

Despite the recent increase in capital flows to Sub-Saharan Africa, the region remains largely marginalized in financial globalization and chronically dependent on official development aid. And with the potential decline in the level of official development assistance in a context of global...

In spite of shallow financial markets, Sub-Saharan Africa will not escape the repercussions of the global financial crisis. The global turmoil threatens the progress Sub-Saharan Africa has made in financial sector deepening and broadening over the recent years and underlines the importance of...

The authors examine the factors affecting the transition to self-employment in Bosnia and Herzegovina, using the World Bank Living Standard Measurement Survey panel household survey for the years 2001-2004. In the beginning of the sample, the country changed its legal framework, with the primary...

This paper critically reviews the literature on finance and inequality, highlighting substantive gaps in the literature. Finance plays a crucial role in most theories of persistent inequality. Unsurprisingly, therefore, economic theory provides a rich set of predictions concerning both the...

The paper analyses how the global economic crisis will affect the economies of the low income Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and discusses the fiscal measures which can be taken to help mitigate the adverse impact of the crisis. It focuses on Tajikistan, the poorest member of the CIS...

Game management areas in Zambia aim to combine nature conservation with economic empowerment of rural households. By looking at households inside and outside game management areas, this study advances the knowledge of the impact of community based natural resource management on household...