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UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) Working Papers
The UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) Working Papers aim to stimulate discussion and critical comment on the broad range of economic, social and environmental issues associated with the United Nations Development Agenda.
ISSN (online):
25206656
Language:
English
175
results
161 - 175 of 175 results
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Poverty and Inequality in Eastern Europe and the CIS Transition Economies
Author: Mihaly SimaiPublication Date: February 2006More LessThis paper deals with the causes and consequences of inequality and poverty in the countries east of the new frontiers of the European Union, mainly with the CIS countries. Poverty and inequalities in the former socialist countries were partly mitigated by the social policies of the state. The transition processes, however, have resulted in new distributions of income and wealth. The new structural sources of poverty and inequalities have often been more extreme. Some CIS countries have moderated poverty, which nonetheless persists in most CIS countries, in spite of some economic improvements.
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Evaluating Targeting Efficiency of Government Programmes
Authors: Nanak Kakwani and Hyun H. SonPublication Date: February 2006More LessThis paper suggests how the targeting efficiency of government programmes may be better assessed. Using the “pro-poor policy” (PPP) index developed by the authors, the study investigates not only the pro-poorness of government programmes geared to the poorest segment of the population but also basic service delivery in education, health and infrastructure. The paper also shows that the targeting efficiency for a particular socio-economic group should be judged on the basis of a ‘total-group PPP index’, to capture the impact of operating a programme for the group. Using micro-unit data from household surveys, the paper presents a comparative analysis for Thailand, the Russian Federation, Viet Nam and 15 African countries.
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What is the Most Effective Monetary Policy for Aid-Receiving Countries?
Authors: Alessandro Prati and Thierry TresselPublication Date: February 2006More LessThis paper analyses how monetary policy can enhance the effectiveness of volatile aid flows. We find that monetary policy is effective in reducing trade balance volatility. We propose the following taxonomy, excluding the case of emergency assistance. Monetary policy should slow down consumption growth and build up international reserves when aid is abundant and deplete them to finance imports and support consumption when aid is scarce. If foreign aid also affects productivity growth, monetary policy should take this productivity effect into account in responding to aid flows.
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Market, Social Cohesion, and Democracy
Author: José Antonio OcampoPublication Date: February 2006More LessThis paper offers three guiding principles for a better relationship between the economy and democracy: democracy as the extension of citizenship; democracy as diversity; and democracy as complementary to clear, strong macroeconomic rules. This view, it is argued, implies that economic and social institutions must be subject to democratic political choice. In this context, it analyses the role of both national and international institutions in improving the complementarity of the market, social cohesion and democracy. The central role of economic and social rights serves as the overarching framework for the analysis.
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Development and Social Goals: Balancing Aid and Development to Prevent ‘Welfare Colonialism’
Author: Erik ReinertPublication Date: January 2006More LessThe current development policy focus on poverty reduction is erroneous. Historically, successful development policy—from the late fifteenth century until the beginning of the twenty-first—has achieved structural change away from dependence on raw materials and agriculture, adding specialized manufacturing and services subject to increasing returns with a complex division of labour. In contrast, the Millennium development Goals are heavily biased in favour of palliative economics: alleviating the symptoms of poverty, rather than attacking its real causes. This creates a system of ‘welfare colonialism’ increasing the dependence of poor countries, thereby hindering, rather than promoting, long-term structural change.
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Rural Development, Environmental Sustainability, and Poverty Alleviation
Author: Susanne D. MuellerPublication Date: January 2006More LessDonors have developed new micro-level and local paradigms to address rural development,environmental sustainability, and poverty alleviation to bypass, ignore, and substitute for badly functioning and corrupt states. Yet, states still set the macro-economic, legal, and policy parameters or “rules of the game” within which other entities operate, and many non-state actors are only nominally independent. Hence, technical initiatives stemming from these paradigms, aimed at growth and equity are often theoretically misconceived and tend to fail when implemented. The paper critically discusses the new paradigms, including decentralization, civil society, microentrepreneurship, and capacity building, among others, mainly using African examples.
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International Capital Flows, Financial Stability and Growth
Author: Graciela L. KaminskyPublication Date: December 2005More LessThe explosion and dramatic reversal of capital flows to emerging markets in the 1990s have ignited a heated debate, with many arguing that globalization has gone too far and that international capital markets have become extremely erratic. In contrast, others have emphasized that globalization allows capital to move to its most attractive destination, fueling higher growth. This paper re-examines the characteristics of international capital flows since 1970 and summarizes the findings of research of the 1990s on the behaviour of international investors as well as the short- and long-run effects of globalization on financial markets and growth.
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Dynamic Links between the Economy and Human Development
Authors: Gustav Ranis and Frances StewartPublication Date: November 2005More LessThis paper empirically confirms the significance of various links in each of two chains over time: from economic growth (EG) to human development (HD), including EG itself, income distribution, the social expenditure ratio and female education; from HD to EG, including HD itself, along with the investment ratio. Our most important conclusion concerns sequencing over time. EG, which is an important input into HD improvement, is itself not sustainable without such improvement, either prior or simultaneous. Therefore, traditional policy advice, which argues that HD improvements must wait until EG expansion makes it affordable, is likely to be in error.
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Trade and Employment
Authors: Bernard Hoekman and L. Alan WintersPublication Date: November 2005More LessThe substantial literature investigating the links between trade, trade policy, and labour market outcomes has generated a number of stylized facts, but many open questions remain. A common finding is that much of the shorter-run impacts of trade and reforms involve reallocation of labour or wage impacts within sectors. Wage responses to trade and trade reforms are generally greater than employment impacts, but trade can only explain a small fraction of the general increase in wage inequality observed in recent decades. A priority area for future research is to study the employment effects of services trade and investment reforms.
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Inequality Trends in Some Developed OECD Countries
Author: John WeeksPublication Date: October 2005More LessThis paper argues that income inequality has increased in several, but not all, developed countries over the last twenty years. The increase in some countries supports the conclusion that the deregulation of markets, resulting in the concentration of economic power, is the fundamental cause as well as the gross manifestation of inequality of both income and wealth.
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Trade Liberalization and Employment
Author: Eddy LeePublication Date: October 2005More LessThis paper reviews both multi-country and country studies on the impact of trade liberalization on growth and employment in developing countries. These studies reveal sharply contrasting effects of trade liberalization on employment, suggesting that country-specific and contingent factors are important. In particular, differences in how trade liberalization is implemented are particularly important. In order to be successful, trade liberalization needs to be embedded within a coherent set of macroeconomic, structural and social policies.
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The Economic and Social Effects of Financial Liberalization
Author: Jayati GhoshPublication Date: October 2005More LessThis paper considers the main elements of the standard pattern of financial liberalization that has become widely prevalent in developing countries. The theoretical arguments in favour of such liberalization are considered and critiqued, and the political economy of such measures is discussed. The problems for developing countries, with respect to financial fragility and the greater propensity to crisis, as well as the negative deflationary and developmental effects, are discussed. It is concluded that there is a strong case for developing countries to ensure that their own financial systems are adequately regulated with respect to their own specific requirements.
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Policy Reform and Income Distribution
Author: Giovanni Andrea CorniaPublication Date: October 2005More LessThe paper analyses the relationship between within-country income inequality and policies of domestic liberalization and external globalization. The models used to provide the rationale for such reforms—such as the Hecksher-Ohlin model—usually predict a decline in inequality. However, the evidence shows that inequality often rose with the introduction of such reforms. The paper tries to explain this discrepancy by identifying the conditions under which the models’ conclusions do not hold. Indeed, such models are based on a simplified view of reality and restrictive assumptions, and their predictions do not necessarily hold in conditions of institutional weakness, structural rigidities, inefficient markets, symmetric information and persistent protectionism.
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A Converging or Diverging World?
Author: Bob SutcliffePublication Date: October 2005More LessThis paper discusses some of the problems of method and data in measuring world inequality. It describes some recent attempts to do so and produces its own estimates. There is no simple answer to the question of whether or not the world is becoming more unequal. If a variety of methods are employed and compared, a complex answer emerges, showing that inequality is both declining in some ways and increasing in others. However, there has clearly been an enormous, recent increase in the gap between the very rich and the very poor.
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A Broad View of Macroeconomic Stability
Author: José Antonio OcampoPublication Date: October 2005More LessThis paper recommends a broad concept of macroeconomic stability, whereby “sound macroeconomic frameworks” include not only price stability and sound fiscal policies, but also a well functioning real economy, sustainable debt ratios and healthy public and private sector balance sheets. These multiple dimensions imply using multiple policy instruments. The paper elaborates a framework for developing countries that involves active use of counter-cyclical macroeconomic policies (exchange rate, monetary and fiscal), together with capital management techniques (capital account regulations and prudential rules incorporating macroeconomic dimensions). It also explores the role of international financial institutions in facilitating developing countries’ use of counter-cyclical macroeconomic policies.
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