This paper examines and tests the existence of political budget cycles in Papua New Guinea during the period 1988–2004. Several factors point to the existence of political budget cycles in Papua New Guinea. The paper provides an overview of the political business cycle literature, and...

We examine the effects of oil rents on corruption and state stability exploiting the exogenous within-country variation of a new measure of oil rents for a panel of 31 oil-exporting countries during the period 1992 to 2005. We find that an increase in oil rents significantly increases...

Kenya’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Annual progress report highlights that sound macroeconomic management policies are finally beginning to yield results in terms of macroeconomic growth, which is the underpinning for future poverty reduction. A high degree of price stability has been...

Canada’s macroeconomic and policy performance has continued to outshine most other industrial countries, and its outlook remains favorable. The new government has pledged to maintain the strong social consensus in favor of fiscal surpluses, while aiming at enhancing incentives. The new...

In recent years, the IMF has released a growing number of reports and other documents covering economic and financial developments and trends in member countries. Each report, prepared by a staff team after discussions with government officials, is published at the option of the member country.

This Selected Issues paper on the United States examines the effect of the structure of the mortgage market on real housing activity and housing prices. The market-based financial structure has reduced the volatility of mortgage lending. Changes in the structure of the mortgage market have...

This Summary Report describes Afghanistan's Interim National Development Strategy (I-ANDS). It assesses the overall policy objectives, analyzes the context of and constraints to the achievement of those objectives, summarizes the government's key strategies and programs, and also reviews...

This paper analyzes progress on the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper—Country Development Strategy (PRSP–CDS) in the Kyrgyz Republic for 2007–10. The CDS is the most important concept paper that outlines midterm vision of the Kyrgyz Republic. The paper also discusses that...

The National Development Strategy of the Republic of Tajikistan mainly complements future renewals and ensures implementation of the development process of the country. The fields of activity of the world community outlined in the Millennium Declaration comply with the national goals and...

This paper is a detailed assessment of compliance of the Basel Core Principles for effective banking supervision adopted by the Argentinean government. The financial sector in Argentina is dominated by the banking sector, with financial conglomerates managing about 85 percent of banking assets,...