rafmacalaba/datause-encoder-data huggingface dataset:
Oil spills on other commodities
This paper examines the effect of crude
            oil prices on the prices of 35 internationally traded
            primary commodities for the 1960-2005 period. It finds that
            the pass-through of crude oil price changes to the overall
            non-energy commodity index is 0.16. At a more disaggregated
            level, the fertilizer index had the highest pass-through
            (0.33), followed by agriculture (0.17), and metals (0.11).
            The prices of precious metals also exhibited a strong
            response to the crude oil price. In terms of individual
            commodities, the estimates of the food group exhibited
            remarkable similarity while those of raw materials and
            metals gave a mixed picture. The implication is that if
            crude oil prices remain high for some time, as most analysts
            expect, then the recent commodity price boom is likely to
            last much longer than earlier booms, at least for food
            commodities. The other commodities, however, are likely to
            follow diverging paths. On the methodological side, the
            results show that price indices, while providing useful
            summary statistics, need to be supplemented by individual
            commodity analysis.
The economic impact of climate
            change on Kenyan crop agriculture : a ricardian approach
This paper measures the economic impact
            of climate on crops in Kenya. The analysis is based on
            cross-sectional climate, hydrological, soil, and household
            level data for a sample of 816 households, and uses a
            seasonal Ricardian model. Estimated marginal impacts of
            climate variables suggest that global warming is harmful for
            agricultural productivity and that changes in temperature
            are much more important than changes in precipitation. This
            result is confirmed by the predicted impact of various
            climate change scenarios on agriculture. The results further
            confirm that the temperature component of global warming is
            much more important than precipitation. The authors analyze
            farmers' perceptions of climate variations and their
            adaptation to these, and also constraints on adaptation
            mechanisms. The results suggest that farmers in Kenya are
            aware of short-term climate change, that most of them have
            noticed an increase in temperatures, and that some have
            taken adaptive measures.
Housing, health, and happiness
Despite the importance of housing for
            people's well-being, there has been little work done to
            assess the causal impact of housing and housing improvement
            programs on health and welfare. In this paper the authors
            help fill this gap by investigating the impact of a
            large-scale effort by the Mexican government to replace dirt
            floors with cement floors on child health and adult
            happiness. They find that replacing dirt floors with cement
            floors significantly reduces parasitic infestations in young
            children, reduces diarrhea, reduces anemia, and improves
            cognitive development. Finally, they also find that this
            program leave adults substantially better off, as measured
            by satisfaction with their housing and quality of life and
            by their significantly lower rates of depression and
            perceived stress.
China, India, and the future of the
            world economy : fierce competition or shared growth
Although both China and India are
            labor-abundant and dependant on manufactures, their export
            mixes are very different. Only one product-refined
            petroleum-appears in the top 25 products for both countries,
            and services exports are roughly twice as important for
            India as for China, which is much better integrated into
            global production networks. Even assuming India also begins
            to integrate into global production chains and expands
            exports of manufactures, there seems to be opportunity for
            rapid growth in both countries. Accelerated growth through
            efficiency improvements in China and India, especially in
            their high-tech industries, will intensify competition in
            global markets leading to contraction of the manufacturing
            sectors in many countries. Improvement in the range and
            quality of exports from China and India has the potential to
            create substantial welfare benefits for the world, and for
            China and India, and to act as a powerful offset to the
            terms-of-trade losses otherwise associated with rapid export
            growth. However, without efforts to keep up with China and
            India, some countries may see further erosion of their
            export shares and high-tech manufacturing sectors.
Canada-Wheat : discrimination,
            non-commercial considerations, and state trading enterprises
Statutory marketing boards that have
            exclusive authority to purchase domestic production, sell
            for export, and set purchase and sales prices of commodities
            are a type of state trading enterprise that is subject to
            World Trade Organization disciplines. This paper assesses a
            recent dispute brought by the United States against Canada,
            alleging that WTO rules require state trading enterprises to
            operate solely in accordance with commercial considerations
            and that the Canadian government did not require the
            Canadian Wheat Board to do so. The panel and Appellate Body
            found that the primary discipline of the WTO regarding state
            trading enterprises was nondiscrimination, and that
            operating on the basis of "commercial
            considerations" was not an independent obligation.
            Instead, WTO disciplines regarding the pricing behavior of
            state trading enterprises use a "commercial
            considerations" test as a possible indicator of
            discrimination. Although a significant degree of price
            discrimination is observed in the case of Canadian wheat
            exports, there are economic arguments why this might also be
            pursued by a private, profit maximizing firm.
Developing economies and
            international investors : do investment promotion agencies
            bring them together
Many countries spend significant
            resources on investment promotion agencies in the hope of
            attracting inflows of foreign direct investment. Despite the
            importance of this question for public policy choices,
            little is known about the effectiveness of investment
            promotion efforts. This study uses newly collected data on
            national investment promotion agencies in 109 countries to
            examine the effects of investment promotion on foreign
            direct investment inflows. The empirical analysis follows
            two approaches. First, it tests whether sectors explicitly
            targeted by investment promotion agencies receive more
            foreign direct investment in the post-targeting period
            relative to the pre-targeting period and non-targeted
            sectors. Second, it examines whether the existence of an
            investment promotion agency is correlated with higher
            foreign direct investment inflows. Results from both
            approaches point to the same conclusion. Investment
            promotion efforts appear to increase foreign direct
            investment inflows to developing countries. Moreover, agency
            characteristics, such as the agency's legal status and
            reporting structure, affect the effectiveness of investment
            promotion. There is also evidence of diversion of foreign
            direct investment due to investment incentives offered by
            other countries in the same geographic region.
Review of environmental, economic
            and policy aspects of biofuels
The world is witnessing a sudden growth
            in production of biofuels, especially those suited for
            replacing oil like ethanol and biodiesel. This paper
            synthesizes what the environmental, economic, and policy
            literature predicts about the possible effects of these
            types of biofuels. Another motivation is to identify gaps in
            understanding and recommend areas for future work. The
            analysis finds three key conclusions. First, the current
            generation of biofuels, which is derived from food crops, is
            intensive in land, water, energy, and chemical inputs.
            Second, the environmental literature is dominated by a
            discussion of net carbon offset and net energy gain, while
            indicators relating to impact on human health, soil quality,
            biodiversity, water depletion, etc., have received much less
            attention. Third, there is a fast expanding economic and
            policy literature that analyzes the various effects of
            biofuels from both micro and macro perspectives, but there
            are several gaps. A bewildering array of policies -
            including energy, transportation, agricultural, trade, and
            environmental policies - is influencing the evolution of
            biofuels.  But the policies and the level of subsidies do
            not reflect the marginal impact on welfare or the
            environment. In summary, all biofuels are not created equal.
            They exhibit considerable spatial and temporal heterogeneity
            in production. The impact of biofuels will also be
            heterogeneous, creating winners and losers. The findings of
            the paper suggest the importance of the role biomass plays
            in rural areas of developing countries. Furthermore, the use
            of biomass for producing fuel for cars can affect access to
            energy and fodder and not just access to food.
The growth in government domestic
            debt : changing burdens and risks
This paper analyzes the recent growth of
            government domestic debt, including central bank debt, using
            a new data base on government domestic debt in developing
            countries with large, open financial systems.  On average,
            government domestic debt grew much faster than GDP between
            1994 and 2004 and became larger than foreign debt. The rapid
            growth of domestic debt reflects financial crises, the
            growth of central bank debt and the greater attractiveness
            to governments of issuing domestic debt as well as the
            recent increase in demands for it.  Both its attractiveness
            and the increased demands for it reflect the current benign
            international environment to some degree.  The main risk of
            government debt, domestic or foreign, remains its overall
            size relative to a country's fiscal, financial, and
            political institutions.  While government domestic debt can
            help the domestic private capital market, large domestic
            debt, like large external debt, has risks.  For example,
            there can be "sudden stops" in the demand for
            domestic debt as well as in foreign lending.  Governments
            need to be aware of the risks and burdens in domestic debt
            issue-crowding out small borrowers, transferring risks to
            banks when issuing longer maturity, fixed-interest domestic
            debt and reducing returns, and imposing risks on holders of
            pensions, annuities, and life insurance policies. Growth of
            central bank debt can divert central banks from pursuit of
            the objective of price stability.
Gender equality, poverty and
            economic growth
This paper reviews empirical findings
            from economic analyses of the role of gender equality and
            women's empowerment in reducing poverty and stimulating
            growth. Going beyond the large literature documenting the
            impact of female education on a range of development
            outcomes, the paper presents evidence on the impact of
            women's access to markets (labor, land, and credit) and
            women's decision-making power within households on
            poverty reduction and productivity at the individual and
            household level. The paper also summarizes evidence from
            studies examining the relationship between gender equality
            and poverty reduction and growth at the macro level.
            Although micro level effects of gender equality on
            individual productivity and human development outcomes have
            been well documented and have important ramifications for
            aggregate economic performance, establishing an empirical
            relationship between gender equality and poverty reduction
            and growth at the macro level has proven to be more
            challenging. The paper concludes by identifying priority
            areas for future research.
Substitution between foreign capital
            in China, India, the Rest of the world, and Latin America :
            much ado about nothing : Substitution between foreign
            capital in China, India, the rest of the world, and Latin
            America : much ado about nothing
This paper explores the impact of the
            emergence of China and India on foreign capital stocks in
            other economies. Using bilateral data from 1990-2003 and
            drawing from the knowledge-capital model of the
            multinational enterprises to control for fundamental
            determinants of foreign capital stocks across countries, the
            evidence suggests that the impact of foreign capital in
            China and India on other countries' foreign capital
            stocks has been positive. This finding is robust to the use
            of ordinary least squares, Poisson, and negative binomial
            estimators; to the inclusion of time and country-pair fixed
            effects; to the inclusion of natural-resource endowments;
            and to the use of the sum of foreign capital stocks in Hong
            Kong (China) and mainland China instead of using only the
            latter's foreign capital stocks. There is surprisingly
            weak evidence of substitution in manufacturing foreign
            capital stocks away from Central America and Mexico in favor
            of China, and from the Southern Cone countries to India, but
            these findings are not robust to the use of alternative
            estimation techniques.
Labor market policy in developing
            countries : a selective review of the literature and needs
            for the future
This paper presents a selective overview
            of the literature on modeling labor market policies in
            developing countries. It considers welfare economics,
            theoretical models, and empirical evidence to highlight the
            three general features needed in future research on labor
            market policy in developing countries. The author identifies
            desirable research components (welfare economics,
            theoretical modeling, and empirical modeling) and pitfalls
            in the literature (inappropriate use of productivity,
            reliance on wrong kinds of empirical studies, lack of
            cost-benefit analysis, attention to only a subset of the
            goods and bads, and fallacy of composition). The paper
            concludes with suggested topics and methods for future
            research. The author states that sound labor market policy
            requires sound labor market models. The paper makes a case
            for developing policy based on explicit evaluation criteria,
            specific theoretical models, and comprehensive empirical evidence.
Property rights in a very poor
            country : tenure insecurity and investment in Ethiopia
This paper provides evidence from one of
            the poorest countries of the world that the property rights
            matter for efficiency, investment, and growth. With all land
            state-owned, the threat of land redistribution never appears
            far off the agenda. Land rental and leasing have been made
            legal, but transfer rights remain restricted and the
            perception of continuing tenure insecurity remains quite
            strong. Using a unique panel data set, this study
            investigates whether transfer rights and tenure insecurity
            affect household investment decisions, focusing on trees and
            shrubs. The panel data estimates suggest that limited
            perceived transfer rights, and the threat of expropriation,
            negatively affect long-term investment in Ethiopian
            agriculture, contributing to the low returns from land and
            perpetuating low growth and poverty.
Investing back home : return
            migration and business ownership in Albania
In view of its increasing importance,
            and the dearth of information on return migration and its
            impacts on source households, this study uses data from the
            2005 Albania Living Standards Measurement Study survey and
            assesses the impact of past migration experience of Albanian
            households on non-farm business ownership through
            instrumental variables regression techniques. Moreover,
            considering the differences in earning potentials and
            opportunities for skill acquisition in different destination
            countries, the impact of household past migration experience
            is differentiated by main migrant destinations, namely
            Greece and Italy. The study also tests for the hypothesis of
            the existence of migration cycles, by differentiating the
            time spent abroad based on the year of return. The empirical
            results indicate that household past migration experience
            exerts a positive impact on the probability of owning a
            non-farm business. While one additional year in Greece
            increases the probability of household business ownership by
            roughly 7 percent, a similar experience in Italy or further
            destinations raises the probability by over 30 percent.
            Although past migration experience for the period 1990-2000
            is positively associated with the likelihood of owning a
            household enterprise, a similar impact does not materialize
            for the period 2001-2004. The latter finding seems
            suggestive of the fact that more recent migrants are yet to
            attain a target level of required savings and skills in
            order to successfully establish a new business upon return.
The vanishing farms the impact of
            international migration on Albanian family farming
This paper investigates the impact of
            international migration on technical efficiency, resource
            allocation and income from agricultural production of family
            farming in Albania. The results suggest that migration is
            used by rural households as a pathway out of agriculture:
            migration is negatively associated with the allocation of
            both labor and non-labor inputs in agriculture, while no
            significant differences can be detected in terms of farm
            technical efficiency or agricultural income.  Whether the
            rapid demographic changes in rural areas triggered by
            massive migration, possibly combined with propitious land
            and rural development policies, will ultimately produce the
            conditions for more viable, high-return agriculture
            attracting larger investments remains to be seen.
Coordinating public debt management
            with fiscal and monetary policies : an analytical framework
This paper proposes a sovereign asset
            and liability management framework for analyzing the
            inter-relationships between debt management, fiscal and
            monetary policies.  It illustrates the consequences of
            uncoordinated policy mix and extends Sargent and Wallace
            (1981 and 1993) by including debt management. Examples of
            policy games played by fiscal, monetary, and debt management
            authorities reinforce the importance of policy separation
            and coordination to prevent domination by one authority over
            another which could lead to inconsistent policy mix.
Entrepreneurship and firm formation
            across countries
The World Bank Group Entrepreneurship
            Survey measures entrepreneurial activity around the world.
            The database includes cross-country, time-series data on the
            number of total and newly registered businesses for 84
            countries.  This paper finds significant relationships
            between entrepreneurial activity and indicators of economic
            and financial development and growth, the quality of the
            legal and regulatory environment, and governance.  The
            analysis shows the importance of electronic registration
            procedures to encourage greater business registration.
            These results can guide effective policymaking and deliver
            new capabilities for identifying the impact of reforms.
Europe and Central Asia's great
            post-communist social health insurance experiment : impacts
            on health sector and labor market outcomes
The post-communist transition to social
            health insurance in many of the Central and Eastern European
            and Central Asian countries provides a unique opportunity to
            try to answer some of the unresolved issues in the debate
            over the relative merits of social health insurance and
            tax-financed health systems. This paper employs a
            regression-based generalization of the
            difference-in-differences method and instrumental variables
            on panel data from 28 countries for the period 1990-2004.
            The authors find that, controlling for any concurrent
            provider payment reforms, adoption of social health
            insurance increased national health spending and hospital
            activity rates, but did not lead to better health outcomes.
            The authors also find that adoption of social health
            insurance reduced employment in the economy as a whole and
            increased unemployment, although it did not apparently
            increase the size of the informal economy.