Pierre-Richard Agénor

Laying a solid foundation of economic facts and ideas, this book provides a comprehensive look at the critical role of public capital in development.

Analytical Foundations for Public Policy

Public Capital, Growth and Welfare

This paper models the Tequila effect (triggered by the collapse of the Mexican peso in December 1994) as a temporary increase in the risk premium faced by domestic private borrowers on world capital markets. The effects of this shock are studied in an intertemporal optimizing framework where firms’ demand for working capital is financed by bank credit. Under the assumption that the perceived duration of the shock is sufficiently long, the model is capable of reproducing some of the main features of Argentina’s economic downturn in the aftermath of the collapse of the Mexican peso: the rise in domestic interest rates, the reduction in net private capital inflows and the drop in official reserves, the reduction in bank deposits and credit supply, the fall in private consumption, the contraction in output, and the increase in unemployment.

Borrowing Risk and the Tequila Effect

This book provides a systematic and coherent framework for understanding the interactions between the micro and macro dimensions of economic adjustment policies; that is, it explores short-run macroeconomic management and structural adjustment policies aimed at promoting economic growth. It emphasizes the importance of structural microeconomic characteristics in the transmission of policy shocks and the response of the economy to adjustment policies. It has particular relevance to the economics of developing countries. The book is directed to economists interested in an overview of the economics of reform; economists in international organizations, such as the UN, the IMF, and the World Bank, dealing with development; and economists in developing countries. It is also a text for advanced undergraduate students pursuing a degree in economic policy and management and students in political science and public policy.

The Economics of Adjustment and Growth

Speculative Attacks and Models of Balance-of-payments Crises

A framework for the analysis of public investment in the developing world In the past three decades, developing countries have made significant economic and social progress, from improved infant mortality rates to higher life expectancy. Yet, 1.3 billion people continue to live in extreme poverty in the developing world, leading policymakers to place a renewed emphasis on policies that could promote economic efficiency and the productivity of the poor. How should these policies be sequenced and implemented to spur growth? Would a large, front-loaded increase in public infrastructure investment yield the desired growth-promoting effect? Taking a rigorous look at this kind of investment and its outcomes, this book explores the different channels through which public capital in infrastructure may affect growth and human welfare, and develops a series of formal models for understanding how these channels operate. Bringing together a vast amount of research in one unifying framework, Pierre-Richard Agénor finds that in considering investment in infrastructure, a variety of externalities need to be factored into analytical models and introduced in policy debates. Lack of access to infrastructure not only constrains the expansion of markets and private investment, it may also hinder the achievement of health and education targets. Ease of access, conversely, promotes innovation and empowers women by allowing them to reallocate their time to productive uses. Laying a solid foundation of economic facts and ideas, Public Capital, Growth, and Welfare provides a comprehensive look at the critical role of public capital in development.

Peter J. Montiel

The global financial crisis triggered severe shocks for developing countries, whose embrace of greater commercial and financial openness has increased their exposure to external shocks, both real and financial. This new edition of Development Macroeconomics has been fully revised to address the more open and less stable environment in which developing countries operate today. Describing the latest advances in this rapidly changing field, the book features expanded coverage of public debt and the management of capital inflows as well as new material on fiscal discipline, monetary policy regimes, currency, banking and sovereign debt crises, currency unions, and the choice of an exchange-rate regime. A new chapter on dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models with financial frictions has been added to reflect how the financial crisis has reshaped our thinking on the role of such frictions in generating and propagating real and financial shocks. The book also discusses the role of macroprudential regulation, both independently and through its interactions with monetary policy, in preserving financial and macroeconomic stability. Now in its fourth edition, Development Macroeconomics remains the definitive textbook on the macroeconomics of developing countries. The most authoritative book on the subject—now fully revised and expanded Features new material on fiscal discipline, monetary policy regimes, currency, banking and sovereign debt crises, and much more Comes with online supplements on informal financial markets, stabilization programs, the solution of DSGE models with financial frictions, and exchange rate crises

Pierre-Richard Agénor

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