International topics
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IMF-Supported Adjustment Programs: Welfare Implications and the Catalytic Effect
The author studies the welfare implications of adjustment programs supported by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). He uses a model where an endogenous borrowing constraint, set up by international lenders who will never lend more than a debt ceiling, forces the borrowing economy to always choose repayment over default. -
World Real Interest Rates: A Global Savings and Investment Perspective
Over the past 15 years, long-term interest rates have declined to levels not seen since the 1970s. This paper explores possible shifts in global savings and investment that have led to this fall in the world real interest rate. -
Exporting and FDI with Endogenous Productivity
This paper provides an analysis of how a firm’s decision to serve a foreign market by exporting or by engaging in foreign direct investment (FDI) affects firm productivity, when productivity is endogeneous as a function of training. The main result of our paper is that, with endogeneous productivity, exporting results in lower productivity than does FDI, but exporting may result in higher or lower employment and output than does FDI.