In response to the spike in rice prices in 2008, the rice subsidy program budget for the Philippines's National Food Authority (NFA) was expanded five-fold to 2.5% of gross domestic product. The NFA is the largest recipient of government subsidy, but also the largest loss-making government...

This paper studies the targeting outcomes of a self‐targeted rice subsidy program in the Philippines. We find modest within‐community targeting outcomes, but weak between‐community targeting. This appears to be because, controlling for the direct influence of household characteristics,...

This paper proposes and analyzes one possible reason why some countries get stuck in the middle-income trap: the role played by the changing structure of the economy (from low-productivity activities into high-productivity activities), the types of products exported (not all products have the...

This paper provides a working definition of what the middle-income trap is. It classifies 124 countries that have consistent data for 1950–2010. First, the paper defines four income groups of gross domestic product per capita in 1990 purchasing power parity dollars: low-income below $2,000; lower...