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WORKING PAPERS
June 25, 2022
We use new, detailed oil data and an event-study design to analyze political change in 36 oil-producing countries that experienced at least 10 years of declining production. We find that when their production starts to decline, they become significantly more democratic, relative to both the overall ...
Blog Post
May 03, 2022
In a recent note, we asked whether IDA, the arm of the World Bank that provides concessional lending to the poorest countries, has the right approach for determining the balance between grants and loans which its recipients receive. We noted that IDA concessionality depends on the level of recipient...
Blog Post
April 22, 2022
Global debt has reached an unprecedented high, surpassing levels experienced in the infamous 1980s crisis. For debt-burdened countries, the COVID-19 pandemic has severely impacted their repayment capacity due to increased crisis spending. Low-income countries (LICs) are experiencing the brunt of thi...
Blog Post
April 20, 2022
In 2021, Ghana announced a plan to issue sovereign bonds of up to $2 billion, with proceeds due partially to fund a free secondary school program. Just months later, Ghana’s rising debt burden means this is no longer feasible. Can developing countries tap the social bond market in order to fund publ...
Blog Post
January 18, 2022
When the pandemic first struck, dealing with excessive debt and debt service burdens of developing countries figured prominently on the international response agenda. The G20 produced the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI)—a program to defer official debt service due by mostly low-income coun...
Blog Post
December 15, 2021
This blog explores the extent to which countries use out of date information to estimate GDP and finds that low-income country (LICs) GDP could be a third higher than currently believed, and that lower middle-income country (LMICs) GDP could be over a quarter higher. In total, this would mean that 7...
Blog Post
November 10, 2021
Last Friday, the Government of Belize alongside the U.S. Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and the Nature Conservancy (TNC) announced the financial close of the largest blue bond for Ocean Conservation to date. The program enables Belize to convert its existing Eurobond (i.e. foreign currency bo...
Blog Post
November 08, 2021
Last weekend was the North East Universities Development Consortium annual conference. Researchers—mostly economists—presented nearly 200 papers on topics from agriculture to COVID to marriage to microfinance. It’s a great introduction to a wide range of current development economics research.