rafmacalaba/datause-encoder-data huggingface dataset:
Methods for measuring the effect of
            adjustment policies on income distribution
The effect of adjustment policies on
            different groups in the population is an important and
            complex issue. The distributional implications can have a
            large influence on the sustainability of programs. In
            particular, there is a need to identify how different groups
            in society are affected by an adjustment program and how an
            alternative mix of policies would affect this outcome. This
            assessment will be useful for developing compensation
            schemes for those groups that may be negatively affected in
            the transitional adjustment period, and in generating
            support for adjustment programs. This paper reviews the
            methodologies that have been suggested to study the effect
            of adjustment on distribution and provides examples of each
            approach. Each method is evaluated and data requirements are
            described. The review provides a range of approaches to
            select a method to apply to a particular country. The paper
            also reviews recent work on macropolicies and income
            distribution and provides recommendations and conclusions.
A RMSM-X model for Turkey
To improve the Bank's macroeconomic
            modeling capabilities, a continuum of macro models referred
            to as RMSM-X and RMSM-XX are being developed. These models
            share a common accounting framework that ensures economic
            consistency among economic sectors. This paper shows how to
            specify the budget constraints and market clearing
            conditions in a RMSM-X model for Turkey. An overview of the
            system defined by the RMSM-X model, the debt module (DM) and
            the data base is presented, along with a detailed
            explanation of the theoretical model. Alternative closure
            rules are discussed and the debt model is presented. This
            paper also includes annexes which present a complete set of
            historical data and an explanation of how the data was constructed.
Do labor market distortions cause
            overvaluation and rigidity of the real exchange rate
The main objective of this paper was to
            measure the importance of labor market distortions in
            explaining the marked tendency to real exchange rate
            overvaluation and the relatively low effectiveness of
            devaluation in Latin America.  The main finding is that
            distortions in the formal labor market are a major factor
            explaining wage rigidity and the diminished responsiveness
            of the real exchange rate to devaluation.  The implication
            is that greater liberalization of the labor market can
            substantially improve the efficacy of exchange rate policies
            in preventing overvaluation of the real exchange rate.
            Another important finding is that changes in the minimum
            wage have substantially broader effects on the wage
            structure of the economy than previously thought.  This, in
            turn, implies that continuous increases in the minimum wage
            are an important factor underlying the observed tendencies
            to overvaluation of the exchange rate in Latin America.
The effects of trade reforms on
            scale and technical efficiency : new evidence from Chile
This paper shows how the industrial
            structure and performance changed after Chile's
            dramatic trade liberalization. A comparison of the 1967 and
            1979 censuses shows little improvement in productivity
            overall, but these figures don't separate the effects
            of trade liberalization from the effects of recession, high
            interest rates, and real appreciation. To isolate the
            effects of trade liberalization, the authors compared
            industries in which protection was significantly reduced
            with industries in which it was not. It was found that of
            the industries for which protection was lifted, the smallest
            plants tended to expand output more. Cross-plant estimates
            of returns to scale dropped significantly. These findings
            are consistent with the view that exposure to foreign
            competition forces suboptimally small producers toward
            minimally efficient scale. Also, production levels became
            higher and more uniform across plants in those industries
            undergoing dramatic reductions in protection. Taken
            together, these results support the received wisdom that
            increased exposure to trade improves competition within an industry.
Conversion factors : a discussion of
            alternate rates and corresponding weights
The significant operational implications
            underlying the Bank's estimates of per capita GNP,
            represent important considerations in systematizing the use
            of official rates in determining the exchange rate to be
            used in the Atlas methodology. This paper discusses issues
            and procedures to develop a time series of alternative
            conversion factors with corresponding weights for use in
            converting and presenting macro-level country statistics in
            a common unit of account, e.g. the U.S. dollar. The focus of
            the paper is on conversion factors that are representative
            of transaction or "effective" conversion factors.
            It also emphasizes the implications for Bank estimates of
            per capita, the kinds of evidence relevant in assessing the
            underlying conversion factors, and identifies countries
            where review of the official exchange rate merits serious
            consideration. The paper reviews the main concerns about the
            adequacy of the official exchange rate as a conversion factor.
Interrelations among child
            mortality, breastfeeding, and fertility in Egypt, 1975-80
This report examines the relationship
            between reproductive behavior and child survival in Egypt.
            The relationship is of fundamental importance to an
            understanding of demographic dynamics and for the
            formulation of population policies. Using Egyptian data from
            1975-80, it was found that weaning children in infancy
            increases ths risk of death for children under five. Early
            weaning is responsible for up to 29 percent of Egyptian
            children's deaths. Children whose mothers become
            pregnant again are more likely to die if the pregnancy
            begins while the child is still an infant. Ending
            breastfeeding is responsible for up to 41 percent of
            pregnancies - 52 percent among women who do not use
            contraceptives. Breastfeeding lasts an average of 17 to 18
            months in Egypt, so policy probably should not encourage all
            women to breastfeed longer, but women who breastfeed for
            only short periods should probably be encouraged to
            breastfeed longer. Parents should be encouraged to be more
            careful about childcare and children's diet and hygiene
            after weaning. An important feature of this analysis is that
            fertility was examined simultaneously with child survival
            and breastfeeding, as three components of a system. The
            analysis involved regression models for the hazard, or risk,
            of three events occurring after a live birth: another
            pregnancy, weaning, or the death of the child.
Modeling economic behavior in
            Peru's informal urban retail sector
In Lima, Peru, the informal sector makes
            up half the labor force, accounts for 61 percent of the
            hours worked, and generates an astounding 39 percent of GDP.
            More than half the street vendors are women.  In the
            informal sector, the free play of market forces determines
            returns to productive factors, especially labor.  Informal
            enterprises are concentrated in low-income areas of urban
            centers.  The authors analyze Peru's urban informal
            sector - particularly women's role in it -  based on a
            theoretical model of informal retail trade.  They address
            these questions: what factors explain differences in the
            performance of retail busineesses?  If these can be
            identified, what types of policy initiatives might improve
            the performance of firms, especially those run by women?
            The authors recommend : channeling credit to small
            businesses, promoting cooperatives and self-help
            associations, providing technical assistance in basic
            management, making it easier and cheaper to get business
            licenses and facilitating cooperative child care centers.
Does the structure of production
            affect demand for schooling in Peru
The author uses the regional structure
            of the economy, proxied by the shares of services and
            industry in regional gross domestic product (GDP), as an
            indicator of the demand for educated workers.  By examining
            whether the level of schooling as a function of shares of
            services and industry differs for men and women, a gender
            bias can be detected in the demand for schooling. The author
            estimates schooling demand functions for males and females
            using data for Peru in the 1980s. His primary findings are :
            1) as services and industry increase their shares of GDP,
            relative to the share of agriculture, the demand for
            schooling of both males and females increases, 2) as the
            share of services in GDP increases compared to agriculture,
            the demand for schooling by women increases more than the
            demand for schooling by men, 3) and increase in the share of
            industry relative to agriculture is associated with an
            increase in the demand for schooling of men rather than of
            women, 4) a decrease in the supply price of schooling
            increases the level of schooling attained by both sexes, but
            the gain is larger for women, and 5) increases in wealth are
            associated with increases in the demand of both sexes for schooling.
How integrated are tropical timber markets
The tropical timber market is
            characterized by multiple species, multiple products, and
            regional patterns of trade and production. In such a market,
            finding a representative price is a difficult and perhaps an
            irrelevant task. So Varangis conducted tests to see whether
            prices from different species, products, and regions move
            together, at least in the long run. If they do, the use of a
            representative price may be appropriate. The analysis could
            also be seen as a test of whether the Asian and
            African/European markets are interdependent.
Does a woman's education affect
            her husband's earnings Results for Israel in a dual
            labor market
A recent focus on decision-making within
            the household has opened a new field of research into the
            economic of marriage and the family.  Recent research
            indicates that in the United States, at least, a wife's
            education has a positive effect on a husband's earning
            capacity - a focused instance of the economic benefits of
            association.  Even if education did not get women jobs or
            improve their ability to function as housewives and mothers,
            it is not wasted. In Israel, however, the authors found that
            the wife's educational level increased a husband's
            earnings in the primary sector (in which workers have good
            jobs, with good pay, security, and fringe benefits) but not
            in the secondary sector (in which workers have low paying,
            unstable, generally unattractive jobs).  These new findings
            are consistent with the general implications of the dual
            labor market model.
Health insurance in sub-Saharan
            Africa : a survey and analysis
Health insurance is one in a portfolio
            of options that are available to augment government
            budgetary resources for health-care spending. Yet, little
            comparative information is available on the kinds of health
            insurance that are presently extant in sub - Saharan Africa.
            The purpose of this paper is to fill that gap in knowledge
            and to define "health insurance". The paper also
            discusses: (a) the prevalence of health insurance; (b) the
            contribution of health insurance to health finance; and (c)
            the characteristics of the health insurance. These schemes
            are analyzed with respect to insurance criteria developed in
            the research literature on health insurance. The paper
            concludes by summarizing what has been learned and the
            conclusions that can be drawn.
Gains in the education of Peruvian
            women, 1940 to 1980
Since the mid 1950s, Peru's
            education policies have been designed to raise skill levels
            and make education available to more of the population.
            Those policies rested mainly on expanding the number of
            schools and as a result, school enrollment rates and
            attainment levels rose. However, an apparent parental
            preference to educate sons more than daughters meant that
            boys' schooling levels rose more quickly than
            girls'. Policies were not enough to bring girls'
            schooling even with boys', especially in rural areas.
            School quality, measured crudely by the supply of textbooks
            and the number of teachers, appears to have improved the
            schooling of women. Peru's education policies have
            reduced the direct costs associated with going to school.
            However, time allocation patterns reveal that the
            opportunity cost to the family of school attendance could be
            an effective barrier to further improvements in school
            enrollment and continuation rates. Even at a young age,
            girls - especially in rural families - participate in the
            labor market and contribute substantially to productive work
            at home.
The determinants of farm investment
            and residential construction in post-reform China
The objective of this paper is to
            clarify, on the basis of detailed farm level data derived
            from recent surveys, the importance of factors related to
            tenure security, farm size and credit availability in
            constraining farmers' agricultural investment. In
            particular, a direct measure of farmers' perceptions
            regarding tenure security will be utilized, as well as
            information on transactions in the credit market. The next
            section provides a description of the study areas. It is
            followed by a discussion of factors affecting farm
            investment and a description of investment patterns in the
            study areas. A formal model of farmers' consumption and
            investment decisions, and an econometric analysis are then
            presented and results are interpreted. The last section
            summarizes the paper.
Private participation in the
            delivery of Guinea's water supply services
The Republic of Guinea has recently
            taken steps to restructure dramatically the urban water
            supply sector and to rehabilitate operations and improve
            financial performance.  This paper outlines the theoretical
            arguments that are relevant to the project design, describes
            the institutional arrangements that were adopted, examines
            the key provisions of the legal documents, and explains how
            the major issues that arose during project preparation were
            addressed.  It presents a general economic theory regarding
            the roles of the public and private sectors in providing
            public services.  The main features and advantages of lease
            contracts are discussed, and the experience in Cote
            d'Ivoire with lease contracts and concessions for water
            supply is summarized.  The recent history of the water
            supply sector in Guinea is also outlined.  The paper
            discusses key features of the new institutional and
            financial arrangements with particular attention to the
            lease contractor selection process, the role of IDA funding,
            key provisions of the legal documents, and the resolution of
            uncertainties regarding the application of World Bank Group
            procurement policies to this case.
The pervasive effects of high
            taxation of capital goods in India
India's heavy duties on capital
            goods blur the incentive signals from the tariff structure.
            In practice, that structure favors import substitution of
            intermediate products from heavy industry and discourages
            exports.  The complex protection structure should be
            simplified, with priority to slashing the duties on capital
            goods.  The purpose of this paper is to contribute further
            to the existing studies by analyzing the international
            dynamics of the protection structure on the basis of recent
            data valid for the late 1980s. The project data were
            assembled with a view to providing quantitative indications,
            and answers to the following questions: (a) What are the
            respective profitabilities of the domestic and international
            markets for Indian industries?; (b) How much of Indian
            industry's lack of international competitiveness stems
            from the extra costs paid for inputs?; (c) What is the
            impact of India's investment costs, grossed-up by
            duties and taxes on imported equipment and by higher prices
            of domestic machinery, on the value added and the effective
            protection of Indian industry?; (d) What is the minimum
            level of nominal protection required by Indian industry to
            compensate for the extra costs paid for its inputs and
            investments?; and (e) To which extent are the actual nominal
            and effective protections received by Indian industry in
            concordance with the levels of protection stemming from
            items (c) and (d) above?
The inflation - stabilization cycles
            in Argentina and Brazil
The Austral plan in Argentina and the
            Cruzado plan in Brazil were major stabilization attempts
            with lasting effects on the inflation process in both
            countries. The purpose of this paper is to understand the
            reasons that led to the large instability in inflation in
            both countries, and to explain why neither country succeeded
            in sustaining a high, but stable rate of inflation. This
            instability was not accompanied by a noticeable increase in
            the average rate of inflation. In Argentina inflation was in
            fact lower on average during the first three years after the
            Austral plan than in the previous three years, while in
            Brazil the increase in the average rate of inflation after
            the Cruzado plan was not dramatic. The paper presents the
            view that the type of instability that emerged following the
            failure of the heterodox shocks was a consequence of the
            large reliance on income policies for stopping inflation in
            the Austral and Cruzado plans and in the follow-up programs.
            It was the repeated use of controls accompanied by
            expectations and anticipations about government actions by
            firms and works that introduced the observed instability
            during this period. The paper presents a summary of the
            process of inflation and gives an in-depth analysis of the
            inflation - stabilization cycles. It concludes with thoughts
            about the sustainability of the regime, and the implications
            of these developments for the design of stabilization
            programmes in both countries.
Alleviating transitory food crisis
            in Africa : international altruism and trade
This paper focuses on criticism about
            the use of emergency food aid in sub-Saharan Africa. More
            specifically, it examines the response of the donor
            community to unexpected or transitory drops in domestic food
            production in 26 countries. The study compares the role of
            food aid and commercial food imports in offsetting these
            shocks and covering the shortfall in food consumption.
            Several hypotheses that determine the tendency of donors to
            respond to the needs of different countries are tested. The
            results suggest that food aid and commercial food imports
            stabilize food consumption and neutralize the effects of
            random shocks to domestic production. Food aid compensates
            for up to 50 percent of the drop in food production; imports
            make up an additional 30 percent. This paper documents the
            stylized facts of food insecurity in Africa and shows the
            relative importance of emergency and total food aid to food
            production and food shortages. The paper includes an
            empirical framework for the estimation and analysis of the
            correlation between food aid and food production and
            presents the results. Lastly, the paper elaborates on the
            economic and political determinants that affect the global
            response to the emergency needs of countries in Africa.
The changing role of the state :
            institutional dimensions
The purpose of this paper is to briefly
            develop the following points: (1) The argument that the size
            of the public sector needs to be drastically reduced has
            probably been taken too far, without really analyzing the
            full consequences of the shift.  Often the dismantling of
            some functions implies the establishment of others. (2) A
            crucial prerequisite for the successful development of the
            private sector is the existence of a modernized and highly
            efficient public sector. (3)  The number of activities that
            the public sector can safely and effectively undertake is
            quite limited.  To force additional functions on the public
            sector increases exponentially the chances of failure and
            poor performance. (4) The change in development strategy
            also requires as a prerequisite a modernization and an
            improved performance of the political process.  The analysis
            has the Latin American reality as background, but is based
            on the broader experience of the World Bank in this area.