In the aftermath of the global financial crisis, it is hard to find any macroeconomic policy report that does not include some reference to financial stability or systemic risk and the resulting need for “macroprudential policies.” While there is a large and growing literature on...

Using a new, large data set on quarterly reserve requirements for the period 1970-2011, this paper provides new evidence on the use of reserve requirements as a countercyclical macroprudential tool in developing countries. The appeal of reserve requirements lies in the pro-cyclical behavior of...

Using a new, large data set on quarterly reserve requirements for the period 1970-2011, this paper provides new evidence on the use of reserve requirements as a countercyclical macroprudential tool in developing countries. The appeal of reserve requirements lies in the pro-cyclical behavior of...

Using a new, large data set on quarterly reserve requirements for the period 1970-2011, this paper provides new evidence on the use of reserve requirements as a countercyclical macroprudential tool in developing countries. The appeal of reserve requirements lies in the pro-cyclical behavior of...

After a growth slowdown that lasted six years (including a contraction of 1.3 percent last year), the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region is finally expected to resume positive growth in 2017, with market analysts forecasting real GDP growth of 1.2 percent for 2017 and 2.3 percent for...

After a growth slowdown that lasted six years, the Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region has finally turned the corner and resumed growth at a modest rate of 1.1 percent in 2017 and 1.8 percent expected in 2018. This reflects a more favorable external environment, particularly a recovery...

After mediocre growth in 2018 of 0.7 percent. LAC is expected to perform only marginally better in 2019(growth of 0.9 percent) followed by a much more solid growth of 2.1 percent in 2020. LAC will face bothinternal and external challenges during 2019. On the domestic front. the recession in...

Using non-linear methods, this paper finds that existing estimates of government spending multipliers in expansion and recession may yield biased results by ignoring whether government spending is increasing or decreasing. For industrial countries, the problem originates in the fact that,...

In the past, industrial countries have tended to pursue countercyclical or, at worst, acyclical fiscal policy. In sharp contrast, emerging and developing countries have followed procyclical fiscal policy, thus exacerbating the underlying business cycle. We show that, over the last decade, about...

We contribute to the literature on tax multipliers by analyzing the pitfalls in identification and measurement of tax shocks. Our main focus is on disentangling the discussion regarding the identification of exogenous tax policy shocks (i.e., changes in tax policy that are not the result of...