The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has imposed a heavy toll on economies worldwide, nearly halting economic activity. Although most firms should be viable when economic activity resumes, cash flows have collapsed, possibly triggering inefficient bankruptcies with long-term detrimental effects....

This paper evaluates a youth internship program in Yemen. We examine the demand for the program and find an oversupply of graduates in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics and a relative undersupply of graduates in marketing and business. Conditional on the types of graduates firms...

Innovative start-ups and SMEs in developing and transition countries often have good ideas, but may not have these ideas fine-tuned to the stage where they can attract outside funding. This is the case in the Western Balkans, where there is a perceived lack of investment readiness of innovative...

Innovative firms with good ideas may still struggle to fine-tune them to the stage where they can attract outside funding. We conduct a five-country randomized experiment that tests the impact of an investment readiness program. Firms then pitched their ideas to independent judges. The program...

Innovative firms with good ideas may still struggle to fine-tune them to the stage where they can attract outside funding. We conduct a five-country randomized experiment that tests the impact of an investment readiness program. Firms then pitched their ideas to independent judges. The program...

Many innovative start-ups and small and medium-size enterprises have good ideas, but do not have these ideas fine-tuned to the stage where they can attract outside funding. Investment readiness programs attempt to help firms to become ready to attract and accept outside equity funding through a...