In this blog post, we examine the rise of several of today’s big military spenders. These risers were not in the top ten spenders in 1990, but high rates of economic growth allowed them to allocate more dollars to the military, displacing countries higher in the list, including G7 nations.

The IMF should be applauded for implementing the Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF). That said, it is highly improbable that extending RSF financing to an additional 44 countries will be feasible in the next one or two years as it would require a major change in the mindset of borrowing co...

In April 2022, the IMF board approved the establishment of the Resilience and Sustainability Trust (RST) to provide financial support to countries addressing two key long-term structural challenges, climate change and pandemic preparedness. Almost a year late, the board has approved RST-supported pr...

With the abandonment of its Zero COVID policy, the Chinese economy is expected to rebound and contribute substantively to global economic growth in the latter part of 2023. This is projected to add to world demand for oil, more than offsetting falling demand from advanced countries whose economies a...

The new year has hardly begun, but fears of a looming recession persist. Pandemic-era increases in health spending are unlikely to continue in low- and middle-income countries. Growing fiscal pressures­—such as high debt, increasing interest rates, and declining foreign aid and revenues—bode ominous...

Earlier this year, the IMF board approved the establishment of the Resilience and Sustainability Trust (RST) to provide financial support to countries addressing long-term structural challenges, including climate change and pandemic preparedness. 143 countries are eligible to receive support from th...

As the world faces multiple crises and the economic and health scars left by the pandemic are still evident, it is clear that governments are unlikely to sustain pandemic-era health spending increases in this recovery phase. How can LMICs align their plans and discourse around universal health cover...