Recent growth papers have utilized the Ben-Porath 1967 mechanism according to which prolonging the period in which individuals may receive returns on their investment spurs investment in human capital and cause growth. Implicitly, one implication of these models is that total labor input over...

This paper analyzes optimal foreign aid policy in a neoclassical framework with a conflict of interest between the donor and the recipient government. Aid conditionality is modelled as a limited enforceable contract. We define conditional aid policy to be self-enforcing if, at any point in time,...

This paper studies how the world accommodates emerging giants. That is, as a large country embarks on a transition path that potentially takes it from being a relatively poor country to joining the ranks of the rich, how does the rest of the world adjust in reallocating its scarce resources?...

In this paper I argue that most comparisons of the unemployment dynamics in the United States and Europe since the war incorrectly neglect the role of technological catch-up in Europe up to the late 1960s and the contribution of the different growth experiences in the two continents. Growth has...

We present a model in which capital assets can only be owned by members of a small politically-connected elite ("the oligarchs"), each member of which faces a given risk of being expropriated, and we investigate the implications of such an imperfection of property rights for the transition to a...

Analyzing a variety of cross-national and sub-national data sources, we show that high adult mortality reduces economic growth by shortening time horizons. Higher adult mortality is associated with increased levels of risky behavior, higher fertility and lower investment in physical and human...

Even though recent evidence suggests that productivity differences between countries account for the bulk of cross-country differences in per capita income levels and that a large part of these productivity differences are due to countries using different technologies, there is no formal...