rafmacalaba/datause-encoder-data huggingface dataset:
States Diverge, Cities Converge :
            Drivers of Local Growth Catch-up in India
This paper takes a fresh look at growth
            convergence in India, combining insights from macroeconomics
            and urban economics. It departs from the existing literature
            in three ways. First, the paper assesses growth patterns
            across districts and across places below the district level
            instead of taking the state as the unit of analysis. Second,
            it relies on household expenditures per capita, instead of
            gross domestic product per capita, to measure living
            standards. And third, it uses a Bayesian model averaging
            approach to identify the key drivers of local growth,
            instead of the classical econometric approach. The paper
            finds absolute convergence in living standards across
            districts and places below the district level, with
            locations in the gray area between rural and urban growing
            fastest. In assessing conditional convergence, it finds that
            geography is a strong predictor of local growth, but
            population density is not. Market access, electrification
            and transport infrastructure matter, but irrigation and
            housing investments do not. The quality of state-level
            governance has a significant impact on local growth, but
            variations in city governance are only mildly relevant. The
            share of medium and large firms plays a role, but the
            sectoral structure of economic activity does not. And the
            coverage of primary education is an important predictor of
            subsequent growth, but not that of other levels of
            education. Strong convergence at the local level can be
            reconciled with lack of convergence at the state level if
            low-income states fail to generate enough locations with the
            "right" characteristics.
On the Asymmetry of Global
            Spillovers : Emerging Markets Versus Advanced Economies
This paper examines growth spillovers
            between emerging markets (EMs) and advanced economies (AEs).
            The empirical results based on a two-block set-up and
            covering the period 1991 to 2015 are twofold. First, the
            paper shows that the size of the spillovers running from EMs
            to AEs is about a fifth of these running from AEs to EMs.
            Second, results point to spillovers from EMs to AEs having
            increased over the second half of the sample period. The
            paper presents suggestive evidence that the (evolving)
            structure of interdependencies play an important role in
            explaining the existence of "asymmetrical
            spillovers" between these similar sized blocks.
Labor Market Effects of Demographic
            Shifts and Migration in OECD Countries
The labor force of each industrial
            country is being shaped by three forces: ageing, education
            and migration. Drawing on a new database for the OECD
            countries and a standard analytical framework, this paper
            focuses on the relative and aggregate effects of these three
            forces on wages across different skill and age groups over
            2000 to 2010. The variation in the age and educational
            structure of the labor force emerges as the dominant
            influence on wage changes. The impact is uniform and
            egalitarian: in almost all countries, the changes in the age
            and skill structure favor the low-skilled and hurt the
            highly skilled across age groups. Immigration plays a
            relatively minor role, except in a handful of open
            countries, like Australia and Canada, where it accentuates
            the wage-equalizing impact of ageing and education.
            Emigration is the only inegalitarian influence, especially
            in Ireland and a few Eastern European countries which have
            seen significant outflows of high-skilled labor to Western
            European Union countries.
Understanding the Geographical
            Distribution of Stunting in Tanzania : A Geospatial Analysis
            of the 2015-16 Demographic and Health Survey
Tanzania is home to the third highest
            population of stunted children in Sub-Saharan Africa, with
            about 2.7 million children under the age of five failing to
            reach their full potential of growth attainment compared
            with the reference population as per the World Health
            Organization standards. Several studies have shown that
            stunted growth during childhood entraps the future of
            children in a vicious circle of recurrent diseases, reduced
            human development, and lower earnings, thus increasing their
            likelihood of being poor when they grow up. To reduce
            stunting, the Government of Tanzania and development
            partners are introducing a convergence of multisectoral
            interventions adapted to local needs. However, the existing
            stunting data are representative only at higher
            administrative levels, thus making it difficult to implement
            these efforts. The paper uses the 2016 geo-referenced
            Demographic and Health Survey in conjunction with relevant
            spatially gridded covariate data, such as nighttime lights,
            water and sanitation access, vegetation index, travel time,
            and so on. Geospatial techniques, such as model-based
            statistics and Bayesian inference implemented using the INLA
            algorithm, along with appropriate model validation exercises
            are employed to develop high-resolution maps of stunting in
            Tanzania at 1×1-kilometer spatial resolution. The maps show
            that areas of consistently high stunting rates tend to be
            more common in rural parts of the country, especially
            throughout the western and southwestern border areas. There
            is high prevalence of low stunting in the urban areas around
            Dar es Salaam, Arusha, and Dodoma, as well as in the south
            of Lake Victoria.
Understanding the Economic Impacts
            of Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Policies on Shipping : What Is
            the State of the Art of Current Modeling Approaches
The International Maritime
            Organization's initial strategy on reduction of
            greenhouse gas emissions from ships stipulates that the
            international shipping sector should assess the impacts on
            states prior to adoption of the mitigation measures included
            in the strategy. This assessment should be undertaken as a
            matter of urgency, and disproportionately negative impacts
            should be assessed and addressed as appropriate. This paper
            aims to contribute to this discussion by reviewing the
            state-of-the-art research on the economic impacts of
            greenhouse gas mitigation measures on states, using
            model-based analysis. Specifically, the paper: (i)
            identifies four areas of economic impacts and their
            relationships, (ii) compiles the latest findings on the
            estimated magnitudes of these impacts, and (iii) presents
            relevant modeling approaches along with best practices for
            selecting and applying these approaches in impact
            assessments. The paper concludes that introducing greenhouse
            gas mitigation measures, such as carbon prices applied to
            bunker fuels in the range of 10 to 50 USD/ton of carbon
            dioxide, might increase maritime transport costs by 0.4
            percent to 16 percent. However, this would only marginally
            increase the import prices of goods (by less than 1
            percent). For transport choices, the increased cost of
            maritime transport induced by greenhouse gas mitigation
            measures might only slightly reduce the share of maritime
            transport, by 0.16 percent globally. Furthermore, a global
            carbon tax applied to all transport modes might stimulate a
            shift toward maritime transport from all other modes. The
            impacts of a carbon price in the range of 10 to 90 USD/ton
            of carbon dioxide on national economies are expected to be
            modest (-0.002 percent to -1 percent of GDP).
Understanding the Economic Impacts
            of Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Policies on Shipping : What Is
            the State of the Art of Current Modeling Approaches
Policy Research Working Paper 8695

# Understanding the Economic Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Policies on Shipping

What Is the State of the Art of Current Modeling Approaches?

_Ronald A. Halim Tristan Smith Dominik Englert_ Climate Change Global Theme January 2019
Trade Effects of the New Silk Road:
            A Gravity Analysis
This paper takes a first look at the
            trade effects of China's Belt and Road Initiative, also
            referred to as the New Silk Road, on the 71 countries
            potentially involved. The initiative consists of several
            infrastructure investment projects to improve the land and
            maritime transportation in the Belt and Road Initiative
            region. The analysis first uses geo-referenced data and
            geographical information system analysis to compute the
            bilateral time to trade before and after the Belt and Road
            Initiative. Then, it estimates the effect of improvement in
            bilateral time to trade on bilateral export values and trade
            patterns, using a gravity model and a comparative advantage
            model. Finally, the analysis combines the estimates from the
            regression analysis with the results of the geographical
            information system analysis to quantify the potential trade
            effects of the Belt and Road Initiative. The paper finds
            that (i) the Belt and Road Initiative increases trade flows
            among participating countries by up to 4.1 percent; (ii)
            these effects would be three times as large on average if
            trade reforms complemented the upgrading in transport
            infrastructure; and (iii) products that use time sensitive
            inputs and countries that are highly exposed to the new
            infrastructure and integrated in global value chains have
            larger trade gains.
Impact of Drought on Poverty in Somalia
Understanding the magnitude and
            importance of income shocks, such as drought or conflict, in
            causing and perpetuating poverty is critical to designing
            policies aimed at building resilience and contributing
            toward the goal of ending poverty. This paper uses
            micro-data from two waves of the Somali High Frequency
            Survey to assess the impact of the severe drought that
            Somalia experienced in 2016/17 on poverty, hunger, and
            consumption. The analysis uses a regression framework to
            quantify the effects of the drought, relying on spatial
            variation in drought exposure and the timing of data
            collection, which took place before and during the drought,
            for identification. The drought is found to have a sizable
            effect on poverty, consumption, and hunger in rural areas,
            where agricultural households and those lacking access to
            infrastructure and basic services are most severely
            affected. A renewed drought shock could lead to an increase
            in poverty of 9 percentage points. The findings underscore
            the importance of investing in rural resilience, especially
            among agricultural households.
Understanding Economic Growth in
            Ghana in Comparative Perspective
Ghana has experienced a decade of solid
            and exceptionally high growth. Between 2005 and 2015, income
            nearly doubled. This paper analyzes the factors driving this
            impressive growth performance, using tools such as
            structural change decompositions and growth regressions. For
            the comparative perspective, the paper compares Ghana with
            its structural and aspirational peers. The paper finds that
            the contribution of structural change to growth has been
            limited and attributes this to labor that was freed up in
            agriculture not being absorbed by high-productivity sectors.
            Looking at factors that drove growth since 2000, financial
            development and infrastructure had the most important
            impacts. A benchmark analysis suggests that those areas
            should remain the policy focus over the longer term, but
            that near-term priority should be given to stabilization policies.
The Medium-Term Impact of
            Entrepreneurship Education on Labor Market Outcomes :
            Experimental Evidence from University Graduates in Tunisia
Despite the widespread popularity of
            entrepreneurship education, there is thin evidence on its
            effectiveness in improving employment outcomes over the
            medium to long term. A potential time lag between
            entrepreneurial intentions and actions is sometimes
            presented as a reason why employment impacts are rarely
            observed. Based on a randomized control trial among
            university students in Tunisia, this paper studies the
            medium-term impacts of entrepreneurship education four years
            after students' graduation. The paper complements
            earlier evidence that documented small, short-term impacts
            on entry into self-employment and aspirations toward the
            future one year after graduation. The medium-term results
            show that the impacts of entrepreneurship education were
            short-lived. There are no sustained impacts on
            self-employment or employment outcomes four years after
            graduation. There are no lasting effects on latent
            entrepreneurship either, and the short-term increase in
            optimism also receded.
Spatio-Temporal Dynamics of Urban
            Growth in Latin American Cities : An Analysis Using
            Nighttime Lights Imagery
The impact of urban form on economic
            performance and quality of life has been extensively
            recognized. The studies on urban form have focused in
            developed countries; only a few cities in developing
            countries have been studied. This paper utilizes nighttime
            lights imagery and information on street networks,
            automatically retrieved from OpenStreetMap, to calculate a
            series of spatial metrics that capture different aspects of
            the urban form of 919 Latin American and Caribbean cities.
            The paper classifies these cities into clusters according to
            these spatial metrics. It also studies the relationship
            between the urban form metrics and some factors that can
            correlate with urban form (topography, size, colony, and
            economic performance) and performs a spatio-temporal
            analysis of urban growth from 1996 to 2010. Among the
            results, the paper highlights the identification of five
            typologies of cities, the tendency of a group of cities to
            grow at a steeper slope, some worrying cases of urban growth
            over protected areas, and a trend toward increasing sprawl
            in some Latin American and Caribbean cities.
Managing South Africa's
            Exposure to Eskom : How to Evaluate the Credit Risk from the
            Sovereign Guarantees
The South African government offers
            various support mechanisms to support Eskom, the state-owned
            electric utility, and the independent power producers in
            providing low-cost electricity, including credit and payment
            guarantees. Guarantees constitute contingent liabilities to
            the government and pose risks to government finances. This
            note illustrates the methodologies explored by South Africa
            to assess the credit risk from guarantees extended to Eskom.
            To manage and closely monitor this risk, a dedicated Credit
            Risk directorate in the Asset and Liability Management
            division at the National Treasury of South Africa has
            implemented a risk assessment and management framework,
            supported by the World Bank Treasury. The team developed a
            sector-specific internal credit rating methodology to assess
            Eskom's creditworthiness. Additionally, the team
            developed a scenario analysis methodology to assess
            Eskom's ability to service debt from cash flows and
            cash reserves. The scenario analysis tool is currently used
            on an ad hoc basis to feed into the various scenarios that
            are considered for the budget process. Risk assessments are
            reported to the Fiscal Liabilities Committee on a quarterly
            basis for risk monitoring and to support recommendations for
            taking on new contingent liabilities, such as government
            guarantees. The Fiscal Liabilities Committee advises the
            minister of finance and is responsible for the determination
            of the processes and policies for approving guarantees and
            guarantee-like transactions. The Fiscal Liabilities
            Committee is generally mandated to promote the optimum
            management of the government's contingent liabilities,
            including guarantees. The implementation of further risk
            mitigation and monitoring tools, such as risk-based
            guarantee fees, budget allocations, and a contingency
            reserve account, is under discussion.
Measuring Farm Labor : Survey
            Experimental Evidence from Ghana
This study examines recall bias in farm
            labor by conducting a randomized survey experiment in Ghana.
            Hours of farm labor obtained from a recall survey conducted
            at the end of the season are compared with data collected
            weekly throughout the season. The study finds that the
            recall method overestimates farm labor per person per plot
            by about 10 percent, controlling for observable differences
            at baseline. Recall bias in farm labor per person per plot
            is accounted for by the fact that households in the recall
            group report fewer marginal plots and farm workers, denoted
            here as listing bias. This listing bias also creates a
            countervailing effect on hours of farm labor at higher
            levels of aggregation, so that the recall method
            underestimates farm labor per plot and per household and
            overestimates the labor productivity of household-operated
            farms. Consistent with the notion that recall bias is linked
            to the cognitive burden of reporting on past events, the
            study finds that recall bias in farm labor has a strong
            educational gradient.
Learning from Developing Country
            Power Market Experiences : The Case of the Philippines
Deep reforms of the Philippine power
            sector began in 2001, aiming at competitive wholesale and
            retail markets. This case study analyzes the Philippine
            experience with wholesale electricity markets at the
            generation level, including design, implementation, and
            outcomes. The spot market began operation in 2006, amidst
            adequate generation capacity albeit highly concentrated
            among few players. The reforms have successfully introduced
            market-driven forces to system operation and spot price
            signals for investments. Investment in new generation has
            recently been commissioned; generation concentration has
            plunged since the market’s inception (mainly due to
            privatization of generation assets); and generation supply
            has been generally secure (barring natural disasters).
            However, serious conflicts due to market power abuse
            occurred in the past; the market remains concentrated in
            four major players; and new competitors have slowly entered
            through the opaque and largely regulated market of bilateral
            contracts. Moreover, following aggressive capacity
            additions, baseload coal generation soared over the past
            decade, reaching 50 percent of total output in 2017, thus
            raising concerns about environmental sustainability, the
            optimal capacity mix (due to lack of investments in flexible
            mid-merit and peaking power plants), and long-term supply
            security of the Philippine power sector (since coal is
            imported). The case of the Philippines' power market
            highlights the importance of adequate ownership structure
            supportive of competition, the need of effective monitoring
            and oversight, especially during initial phases of the
            market, and the benefits and challenges that open and
            competitive wholesale markets can provide over time,
            especially in interaction with vertical integration (whether
            through cross-ownership or through bilateral contracts).
Poverty Impact of Food Price Shocks
            and Policies
In the event of large swings in world
            food prices, countries often intervene to dampen the impact
            of international food price spikes on domestic prices and to
            lessen the burden of adjustment on vulnerable population
            groups. While individual countries can succeed at insulating
            their domestic markets from short-term fluctuations in
            global food prices, the collective intervention of many
            countries may exacerbate the volatility of world prices.
            Insulating policies introduced during the 2010-11 food price
            spike may have accounted for 40 percent of the increase in
            the world price of wheat and one-quarter of the increase in
            the world price of maize. Combined with government policy
            responses, the 2010-11 food price spike tipped 8.3 million
            people (nearly 1 percent of the world's poor) into poverty.