Does capital flow to locations with a relatively high rate of return? We address this question by constructing a panel database of over 100 countries between 1950 and 2005, accounting for about 99 percent of world real income in 2005. With these data, we construct two measures of the rate of...

Sovereign defaults are time consuming and costly to resolve ex post. But these costs also improve borrowing incentives ex ante. What is the optimal tradeoff between efficient borrowing ex ante and the costs of default ex post? What policy reforms, from collective action clauses to an...

International capital markets do not work perfectly. But are the imperfections severe enough that they need to be taken into account when modeling international capital flows? And if so, which of the many different possible forms of financial market imperfection best describe the data on...

Most economic activity occurs in cities. This creates a tension between local increasing returns, implied by the existence of cities, and aggregate constant returns, implied by balanced growth. To address this tension, we develop a general equilibrium theory of economic growth in an urban...

Negotiations between a country in default and its international creditors are modeled as a dynamic game in an environment of weak contractual enforcement. The country cannot borrow internation- ally until it settles with all creditors. Delay arises in equilibrium as creditors engage in strategic...