Ukraine’s economic performance has been anemic since the early 1990s. A major impediment to productivity growth has been low investment, held back by lack of strong and independent institutions. This paper aims to assess the major areas of institutional weakness in Ukraine and quantify the long-term growth impact of catching-up to Poland in terms of the quality of major economic institutions and market development. Our analysis identifies the legal system as the area where the institutional quality is weakest compared to Poland, followed distantly by market competition, openness to trade and financial depth. Using a methodology that accounts for positive spillovers between the structural reform areas, we estimate that even under the most optimistic scenario, where institutional gaps are fully addressed, Ukraine would need 15 years to catch up to Poland’s current income level.
This volume examines the impact on economic performance of structural policies-policies that increase the role of market forces and competition in the economy, while maintaining appropriate regulatory frameworks. The results reflect a new dataset covering reforms of domestic product markets, international trade, the domestic financial sector, and the external capital account, in 91 developed and developing countries. Among the key results of this study, the authors find that real and financial reforms (and, in particular, domestic financial liberalization, trade liberalization, and agricultural liberalization) boost income growth. However, growth effects differ significantly across alternative reform sequencing strategies: a trade-before-capital-account strategy achieves better outcomes than the reverse, or even than a "big bang"; also, liberalizing the domestic financial sector together with the external capital account is growth-enhancing, provided the economy is relatively open to international trade. Finally, relatively liberalized domestic financial sectors enhance the economy's resilience, reducing output costs from adverse terms-of-trade and interest-rate shocks; increased credit availability is one of the key mechanisms.
This paper assesses the effects of structural reforms on firm-level productivity for 37 developing countries from 2006 to 2014 period. It takes advantage of the IMF Monitoring of Fund Arrangements dataset for reform indexes and the World Bank Enterprise Surveys for firm-level productivity. The paper highlights the following results. Structural reforms such as financial, fiscal, real sector, and trade reforms, significantly improve firm-level productivity. Interestingly, real sector reforms have the most sizeable effects on firm-level productivity. The relationship between structural reforms and firm-level productivity is nonlinear and shaped by some firms’ characteristics such as the financial access, the distortionary environment, and the size of firms. The pace of structural reforms matters since being a “strong reformer” is associated with a clear productivity dividend for firms. Finally, except for financial and trade reforms, all structural reforms under consideration are bilaterally complementary in improving firm-level productivity. These findings are robust to several sensitivity checks.
Across the OECD, governments are seeking to undertake structural reforms to strengthen their economic growth. Based on a broad set of indicators of structural policies and performance, Going for Growth 2007 takes stock of the recent progress made in implementing policy reforms and identifies, for each OECD country, five policy priorities to lift growth. It calls for reforms in areas such as product and labour market regulation, taxation, pension, income support, health and education to boost labour productivity and employment. The set of internationally comparable indicators provided here enables countries to assess their economic performance and structural policies in a broad range of areas. The publication puts together the knowledge accumulated at the OECD in these various fields. In addition, this issue contains four analytical chapters covering: The employment effects of policies and institutions Product market regulation and productivity convergence Policies to strengthen competition in product markets Factors shaping the implementation of structural reform
“This is an extraordinary book from an extraordinary person. This book is an insightful, candid and passionate account of her approach and policy experience. She has called it a ‘Practical Manual’ for reforms – it is that but also much more: a historical record of reforms against all odds.” – Erik Berglof, Director of LSE Institute of Global Affairs “Many emerging economies often lack practical experience in transforming themselves into fully-functioning market-oriented economies and this Practical Manual will help you with this task. Moreover, the book is precisely about how to accomplish drastic reforms in wartime – and I truly believe that the wartime of COVID-19 is an unprecedented opportunity for reform.” – Valeria Gontareva, Former Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine In addition, Valeria received a nomination for her work as the Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine in the Financial Times’s Women of the Year 2019 list.
This issue includes a general assessment, a special chapter on the effects of digitalisation on productivity and a chapter summarising developments and providing projections for each individual country.
The COVID-19 pandemic struck the global economy after a decade that featured a broad-based slowdown in productivity growth. Global Productivity: Trends, Drivers, and Policies presents the first comprehensive analysis of the evolution and drivers of productivity growth, examines the effects of COVID-19 on productivity, and discusses a wide range of policies needed to rekindle productivity growth. The book also provides a far-reaching data set of multiple measures of productivity for up to 164 advanced economies and emerging market and developing economies, and it introduces a new sectoral database of productivity. The World Bank has created an extraordinary book on productivity, covering a large group of countries and using a wide variety of data sources. There is an emphasis on emerging and developing economies, whereas the prior literature has concentrated on developed economies. The book seeks to understand growth patterns and quantify the role of (among other things) the reallocation of factors, technological change, and the impact of natural disasters, including the COVID-19 pandemic. This book is must-reading for specialists in emerging economies but also provides deep insights for anyone interested in economic growth and productivity. Martin Neil Baily Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution Former Chair, U.S. President’s Council of Economic Advisers This is an important book at a critical time. As the book notes, global productivity growth had already been slowing prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and collapses with the pandemic. If we want an effective recovery, we have to understand what was driving these long-run trends. The book presents a novel global approach to examining the levels, growth rates, and drivers of productivity growth. For anyone wanting to understand or influence productivity growth, this is an essential read. Nicholas Bloom William D. Eberle Professor of Economics, Stanford University The COVID-19 pandemic hit a global economy that was already struggling with an adverse pre-existing condition—slow productivity growth. This extraordinarily valuable and timely book brings considerable new evidence that shows the broad-based, long-standing nature of the slowdown. It is comprehensive, with an exceptional focus on emerging market and developing economies. Importantly, it shows how severe disasters (of which COVID-19 is just the latest) typically harm productivity. There are no silver bullets, but the book suggests sensible strategies to improve growth prospects. John Fernald Schroders Chaired Professor of European Competitiveness and Reform and Professor of Economics, INSEAD
On August 24-25, 2010, the National Defense University held a conference titled “Economic Security: Neglected Dimension of National Security?” to explore the economic element of national power. This special collection of selected papers from the conference represents the view of several keynote speakers and participants in six panel discussions. It explores the complexity surrounding this subject and examines the major elements that, interacting as a system, define the economic component of national security.
Assessing Aid determines that the effectiveness of aid is not decided by the amount received but rather the institutional and policy environment into which it is accepted. It examines how development assistance can be more effective at reducing global poverty and gives five mainrecommendations for making aid more effective: targeting financial aid to poor countries with good policies and strong economic management; providing policy-based aid to demonstrated reformers; using simpler instruments to transfer resources to countries with sound management; focusing projects oncreating and transmitting knowledge and capacity; and rethinking the internal incentives of aid agencies.
The OECD Economic Outlook is the OECD's twice-yearly analysis of the major economic trends and prospects for the next two years. This issue includes a general assessment of the macroeconomic situation, a series of notes on the macroeconomic and structural policy issues related to the COVID-19 outbreak and a chapter summarising developments and providing projections for each individual country.
