Antonio Ciccone
- 25 January 2008
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 852Details
- Abstract
- Many factors inhibiting and facilitating economic growth have been suggested. Will international income data tell which matter when all are treated symmetrically a priori? We find that growth determinants emerging from agnostic Bayesian model averaging and classical model selection procedures are sensitive to income differences across datasets. For example, many of the 1975-1996 growth determinants according to World Bank income data turn out to be irrelevant when using Penn World Table data instead (the WB adjusts for purchasing power using a slightly different methodology). And each revision of the 1960-1996 PWT income data brings substantial changes regarding growth determinants. We show that research based on stronger priors about potential growth determinants is more robust to imperfect international income data.
- JEL Code
- E01 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→General→Measurement and Data on National Income and Product Accounts and Wealth, Environmental Accounts
O47 : Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth→Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity→Measurement of Economic Growth, Aggregate Productivity, Cross-Country Output Convergence
- 13 June 2007
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 758Details
- Abstract
- Does cutting red tape foster entrepreneurship in industries with the potential to expand? We address this question by combining the time needed to comply with government entry procedures in 45 countries with industry-level data on employment growth and growth in the number of establishments during the 1980s. Our main empirical finding is that countries where it takes less time to register new businesses have seen more entry in industries that experienced expansionary global demand and technology shifts. Our estimates take into account that proxying global industry shifts using data from only one country-or group of countries with similar entry regulations-will in general yield biased results.
- JEL Code
- E6 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook
F43 : International Economics→Macroeconomic Aspects of International Trade and Finance→Economic Growth of Open Economies
L16 : Industrial Organization→Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance→Industrial Organization and Macroeconomics: Industrial Structure and Structural Change, Industrial Price Indices
- 12 May 2006
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 623Details
- Abstract
- Do high levels of human capital foster economic growth by facilitating technology adoption? If so, countries with more human capital should have adopted more rapidly the skilled-labor augmenting technologies becoming available since the 1970's. High human capital levels should therefore have translated into fast growth in more compared to less human-capital-intensive industries in the 1980's. Theories of international specialization point to human capital accumulation as another important determinant of growth in human-capital-intensive industries. Using data for a large sample of countries, we find significant positive effects of human capital levels and human capital accumulation on output and employment growth in human-capitalintensive industries.
- JEL Code
- E13 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→General Aggregative Models→Neoclassical
F11 : International Economics→Trade→Neoclassical Models of Trade
O11 : Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth→Economic Development→Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development