Working Papers
2007
May 1, 2007
Financial Sector Reforms and Prospects for Financial Integration in Maghreb Countries
Description: A healthy and dynamic financial sector is essential to achieving high and sustainable economic growth in the Maghreb region-Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, and Tunisia. Financial integration within the Maghreb region will help deepen financial markets, increase their efficiency, and enhance the resilience of economies to shocks. It can also play a catalyst role for the global financial integration of the Maghreb region. This paper provides an overview of the financial systems, takes stock of the reform effort and highlights the challenges ahead, and examines the prospects for financial integration in the five Maghreb countries.
May 1, 2007
Coping with Spain’s Aging: Retirement Rules and Incentives
Description: This paper evaluates the macroeconomic and welfare effects of extending the averaging period used to calculate pension benefits in a pay-as-you-go system. It also examines the complementarities between reforms extending the averaging period and those increasing the retirement age under alternative tax policies. The analysis is based on a model in the Auerbach-Kotlikoff tradition applied to the Spanish economy. Without reforms, the simulations suggest that aging-related spending as a share of output will increase 16 percentage points by 2050, which are twice as much as in European Commission (2006) projections due to general equilibrium effects. Also, reforms extending the averaging period to the entire work life limit expenditure pressures at the peak of the demographic shock as much as increasing the retirement age in line with life expectancy (4 percentage points of GDP). These reforms and prefunding the demographic shock mitigate the adverse macroeconomic effects of aging and improve welfare.
May 1, 2007
The Convergence Dynamics of a Transition Economy: The Case of the Czech Republic
Description: In this paper we develop a two-country dynamic general equilibrium model by means of which we seek to explain the long-run paths of a converging emerging market economy. We borrow a paradigm from the New Open Economy Macroeconomics literature and amend it to address specific features such as initial asymmetry in development and size of economies as well as different speed of capital accumulation. Using a calibration of productivity and deep parameters for the Czech economy we demonstrate the ability of the model to consistently replicate dynamics in key macroeconomic variables that are essential inputs for commonly used "gap models" in monetary policy routine. Based on the calibration we draw implications for future convergence of the Czech economy.
May 1, 2007
Informality and Regulations: What Drives Firm Growth?
Description: The paper relies on a rich firm-level data set on transition economies to examine the role of informality as an important channel through which regulatory and other policy constraints affect firm growth. We find that firms reduce their formal operations with a higher tax and regulatory burden, but increase it with better enforcement quality. In terms of firm growth, we find a differential impact of regulatory burden and enforcement quality on formal and informal firms. In particular, we find that growth in formal firms is negatively affected by both tax and financing constraints, while these constraints are insignificant for growth in informal firms. Moreover, formal firm growth improves with better enforcement as measured by fair and impartial courts, while informal firm growth is constrained by organized crime, pointing to their inability to take full advantage of the legal and judicial systems. Finally, when we look at country-wide institutions, we find that higher regulatory burden reduces firm growth. An interactive term between a country-wide measure of the rule of law and a proxy for formality suggests that better enforcement quality dampens the relatively weaker growth in formal firms.
May 1, 2007
Pension Reform in China: The Need for a New Approach
Description: The rapid aging of China's population over the next few decades makes it important for a new pension system with broad and adequate coverage to be put in place quickly. Pension reforms, first initiated in 1997, have become bogged down in difficulties over dealing with the "legacy costs" associated with the relatively more generous benefits provided under the old system. This paper argues that a way forward is to separate the legacy problem from the problem of setting up a new pension system, and it suggests concrete proposals for setting up such a new system which would cover both urban and rural workers.
May 1, 2007
Pension Reform and Macroeconomic Stability in Latin America
Description: This paper reviews macroeconomic aspects of pension reforms in Latin America, focusing on financial market stability and fiscal sustainability. Concentration of pension fund portfolios in government bonds remains high, and the lack of new investment alternatives has distorted asset prices. Countries have gradually liberalized investments abroad, but remain wary of the impact on foreign currency markets. The fiscal costs of the transition to funded systems have been higher than expected, and have contributed to high debt levels. The paper highlights the importance of coordinating changes in portfolio limits with debt management policies and measures to develop securities markets.
May 1, 2007
Tax Potential vs. Tax Effort: A Cross-Country Analysis of Armenia's Stubbornly Low Tax Collection
Description: Despite recording double digit growth since 2000, Armenia's tax-to-GDP ratio has been fairly stable at about 14½ percent. This paper catalogues a range of factors that may account for Armenia's stubbornly for tax collection by benchmarking Armenia's tax-to-GDP against some comparator countries and conducting an extensive econometric study of the main determinants of tax collection. We find empirical support for the hypothesis that the persistence of Armenia's low tax-GDP ratio can be traced to persistence of weak institutions and a large shadow economy. The gap between the potential and actual tax collection in Armenia could be as high as 6½ percent of GDP. We conclude with some policy recommendations that, if adopted, can boost revenue buoyancy.
April 1, 2007
Trade Adjustment and Human Capital Investments: Evidence from Indian Tariff Reform
Description: Do the short and medium term adjustment costs associated with trade liberalization influence schooling and child labor decisions? We examine this question in the context of India's 1991 tariff reforms. Overall, in the 1990s, rural India experienced a dramatic increase in schooling and decline in child labor. However, communities that relied heavily on employment in protected industries before liberalization do not experience as large an increase in schooling or decline in child labor. The data suggest that this failure to follow the national trend of increasing schooling and diminishing work is associated with a failure to follow the national trend in poverty reduction. Schooling costs appear to play a large role in this relationship between poverty, schooling, and child labor. Extrapolating from our results, our estimates imply that roughly half of India's rise in schooling and a third of the fall in child labor during the 1990s can be explained by falling poverty and therefore improved capacity to afford schooling.
April 1, 2007
Financial Market Risk and U.S. Money Demand
Description: This paper examines empirically U.S. broad money demand emphasizing the role of financial market risk. We find that money demand rises with the liquidity risk of stock markets or the credit risk of corporate bond markets. After controlling for the effect of financial market risk, money demand becomes relatively stable over the last 35 years. At the sectoral level, household money holdings continue to be stable in a traditional model controlling for a decline in transactions costs for investing in mutual funds in the early 1990s. In contrast, business money holdings have been consistently (positively) associated with credit risk.
April 1, 2007
Financial Market Implications of India’s Pension Reform
Description: India's planned pension reform will set up a proper regulatory framework for the pension industry and open up the sector to private fund managers. Drawing on international experiences, the paper highlights pre-conditions for the reform to kick-start financial development, including: (i) the buildup of critical mass; (ii) sufficiently flexible investment guidelines and regulations, including on investments abroad; and (iii) concurrent reforms in capital markets. Given the limited scale of the planned reform, the key challenge for India is to achieve sufficient critical mass early on. Options to address this challenge include granting permission for existing workers to switch to the new system or outsourcing all or part of the reserves of private sector provident funds to the new pension fund managers.