IMF Staff Papers

May 30, 2007

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 54, No. 3

Description: This issue features a timely paper by Vladimir Klyuev and Paul Mills on the role of personal wealth and home equity withdrawal in the decline in the U.S. saving rate. Lusine Lusinyan and Leo Bonato explain how work absence in 18 European countries affects labor supply and demand. And a paper by Paolo Manasse (University of Bologna) entitled "Deficit Limits and Fiscal Rules for Dummies" examines fiscal frameworks.

December 15, 2006

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 53, No. 3

Description: This is the final issue for 2006 (Volume 53), and contains another paper in the occasional Special Data Section that seeks to measure financial development in the Middle East and North Africa by utilizing a new database. The issue also contains a comment from Jacques J. Polak on parity reversion in real exchange rates.

September 16, 2006

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 53, 2006, Special Issue

Description: This Special Issue for 2006 (Volume 53) combines five papers that emerged from the Sixth Annual Jacques Polak Research Conference in November 2005, including the annual Mundell-Fleming Lecture. The issue is rounded out with three regular refereed papers in the journal series.

June 29, 2006

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 53, No. 2

Description: Noteworthy among the six papers appearing in this latest issue of the IMF's peer-reviewed journal is another installment in the Special Data Section. Anthony Pellechio and John Cady from the IMF's Statistics Department take a close look at differences in IMF data; how and when they could occur; and what the implications of such differences might be for end-users of the IMF's data.

April 3, 2006

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 53, No. 1

Description: This first issue for 2006 is anchored by two papers on Russia. The opening paper discusses Russia and the World Trade Organization, and the concluding paper, by John Odling-Smee (former Director of the IMF's European II Department), presents a comprehensive and authoritative history of the IMF's relations with Russia during the 1990s. Other articles in this issue cover rent-seeking behavior, estimations of government net capital stocks, and three papers cover different aspects of exchange rates.

Notes: Issues from 1998 onward are available for free online

December 22, 2005

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 52, No. 3

Description: This last issue for 2005 comprises seven new papers, including a contribution to the journal's occasional Special Data Section about domestic debt markets in Sub-Saharan Africa, and also an in-depth look at the internal job market for entry-level economists at the IMF. The remaining articles cover toics as diverse as: modeling of asset markets, exchange rates in developing countries, international bank claims on Latin America, the effectiveness of "early warning" systems, and the use (by emerging market countries) of the IMF's Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS).

Notes: Issues from 1998 onward are available for free online

August 30, 2005

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 52, Special Issue, IMF Conference in Honor of Michael Mussa

Description: This paper focuses on expectations for the American economy focused on the likelihood of secular stagnation, which continued to be debated throughout the post-war period. Concerns rose during the late 1960s and early 1970s about rapid population growth smothering the potential for economic growth in developing countries were contradicted when, during the mid- and late-1970s, fertility rates began to decline rapidly. In policy-oriented institutions (and in most businesses and individual decision making), policymaking decisions are often guided by projections and forward-looking indicators. The case of Michael Mussa has been one of great anticipation, and of great accomplishment, and all the early optimistic forecasts about him have turned out to be correct. Within the sphere of economics, undoubtedly the most famous and widely used forecast—one, incidentally, that thus far has often been incorrect—is that based on the Malthusian doctrine of the relationship between resources and population.

Notes: Issues from 1998 onward are available for free online

August 29, 2005

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 52, No. 2

Description: This paper examines contractionary currency crashes in developing countries. It explores the causes of India’s productivity surge around 1980, more than a decade before serious economic reforms were initiated. The paper finds evidence that the trigger may have been an attitudinal shift by the government in the early 1980s that, unlike the reforms of the 1990s, was pro-business rather than pro-market in character, favoring the interests of existing businesses rather than new entrants or consumers. A relatively small shift elicited a large productivity response, because India was far away from its income possibility frontier.

Notes: Issues from 1998 onward are available for free online

April 18, 2005

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 52, No. 1

Description: This first issue of IMF Staff Papers for 2005 contains 7 papers that discuss: whether output recovered after the Asian crisis; the value of a country's trading partners to its own economic growth; whether interdependence is a factor in understanding the spread of currency crises; can remittance payments from expatriates be a reliable source of capital for economic development?; total factor productivity; designing a VAT for the energy trade in Russia and Ukraine; and lastly, a discussion of the reasons for central bank intervention in ERM-I since 1993

Notes: Issues from 1998 onward are available for free online

November 23, 2004

IMF Staff Papers, Volume 51, No. 3

Description: This paper tests uncovered interest parity (UIP) using interest rates on longer maturity bonds for the Group of Seven countries. These long-horizon regressions yield much more support for UIP—all of the coefficients on interest differentials are of the correct sign, and almost all are closer to the UIP value of unity than to zero. The paper also analyzes the decision by a government facing electoral uncertainty to implement structural reforms in the presence of fiscal restraints similar to the Stability and Growth Pact.

Notes: Issues from 1998 onward are available for free online