Publications

April 2011 (Revised May 2013)
Case

South Africa (A): Stuck in the Middle?

By: Richard H. K. Vietor and Diego Comin

Fifteen years after ending apartheid, formal unemployment in South Africa was still at 24%. While the country had grown at 4 to 5% annually during the 2000s, the financial crisis set it back by 1 million more unemployed. Moreover, it seemed as if the nation were stuck... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Inflation and Deflation; Policy; Employment; Wages; Competition; South Africa

July 2005 (Revised December 2006)
Case

Japan: Deficits, Demography, and Deflation

By: Richard H.K. Vietor

By 2005, Japan's debt had risen to 163% of GDP. For more than a decade, the government had run huge deficits, trying unsuccessfully to stimulate economic growth. Interest rates, meanwhile, had been zero for years. But with slow growth and banks in crisis, nothing had... View Details

Keywords: Economy; Economic Growth; Demographics; Financial Condition; Inflation and Deflation; Banks and Banking; Borrowing and Debt; Macroeconomics; Policy; Government and Politics; Welfare; Health Care and Treatment; Japan

2022
Chapter

Lessons Learned from Support to Business during COVID-19

By: Gabriel Chodorow-Reich, Benjamin Iverson and Adi Sunderam

The authors survey the new federal subsidies and loans provided to businesses in the first year of the pandemic—including the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), the Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program, and aid targeted at specific industries such as airlines... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Small Business; Government Legislation; Policy

Read Now

01 May 2006
What Do You Think?

Who Will Cast a Longer Shadow on the 21st Century: Friedman or Galbraith?

the latter's Vermont farm, according to biographer Richard Parker. Galbraith, in his book The Affluent Society, argued for the importance of fiscal policy in influencing the allocation of resources between... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

19 Mar 2007
Research & Ideas

Handicapping the Best Countries for Business

competitiveness of her exports and the costs of her imported inputs. In a microeconomic sense, the business person also cares about tariffs (which affect trade), industrial policies, tax policies (on business directly, but also View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

Research Summary

Overview

By: Matthew C. Weinzierl

My academic research centers on uncovering and closing gaps between the theory and reality of tax policy. My main contribution has been to identify and address a mismatch between the goals for taxation typically assumed in theory and the goals the public and... View Details

15 May 2007
Working Paper Summaries

How is Foreign Aid Spent? Evidence from a Compelling Natural Experiment

Keywords: by Eric Werker, Faisal Z. Ahmed & Charles Cohen

22 May 2007
First Look

First Look: May 22, 2007

other distortions measured in the literature. The second uncertain policy we consider concerns marginal tax rates. We obtain similar results once we adjust for the impact of tax rates on income. Download the paper:... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

17 Nov 2009
First Look

First Look: Nov. 17

Working PapersUser, and Open Collaborative Innovation: Ascendent Economic Models Authors:Carliss Y. Baldwin and Eric von Hippel Abstract In this paper we assess the economic viability of innovation by producers relative to two increasingly important alternative... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

March 2010 (Revised May 2013)
Case

Chile's Copper Surplus: The Road Not Taken (A)

By: Laura Alfaro, Dante Roscini and Renee Kim

In 2008, Andres Velasco, Chile's Finance Minister, was under mounting criticisms over his fiscal policy. As the world's largest copper producer, Chile was benefiting from the rise in copper prices, which had more than tripled since 2003. Copper revenues translated into... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Economic Growth; Metals and Minerals; Investment Funds; Policy; State Ownership; Wealth; Chile