rafmacalaba/datause-encoder-data huggingface dataset:
A harmonization of the rules, as well as an improvement in the efficiency of judicial systems, is therefore imperative to keep international trade financing going and possibly growing. For example, bilateral or multilateral agreements might be encouraged in an attempt to provide a more even playground for firms in developing countries seeking to export to developed countries.<sup>21</sup> To this aim, the Djankov _et al._ (2003) index of formalism might be used to target the countries on which to intervene. Although this index concerns two specific domestic disputes arising across several different countries, it may notwithstanding provide a qualitative assessment of the “distance” in terms of judicial efficiency between trading countries and inform about the dyads or groups of countries for which such interventions are more needed.

Similarly, Djankov _et al._ (2008) index of efficiency of bankruptcy procedures might inform about the countries where bankruptcy regimes are less efficient and which more urgently call for reforms. This issue is clearly important _per se_ , as a good bankruptcy regime maximizes the total value available to be divided between debtor and creditors and thus allows reducing the ex-ante cost of credit. However, the issue is also important for the implications that the crisis may have for corporate failures. From the last section, it has emerged that, especially for firms along supply chains, distress may have self-reinforcing effects and cause systemic defaults. There is therefore an issue of whether existing bankruptcy regimes can adequately deal with situations of this type or rather some reforms are needed to alleviate the effects of the crisis. The issue is taken up by Djankov (2009), who discusses a menu of possible reforms designed to deal with situations of distress following a crisis: the superpriority of fresh capital, prepackaged bankruptcy, super bankruptcy.

Particularly interesting in the light of the discussion on inter-firm finance as a mechanism of propagation of shocks is the super-priority of fresh capital. As argued in section 4.3, in times of crisis it is important that financing be available along the chain to absorb negative shocks and prevent inefficient liquidation. One possible solution is to reform the bankruptcy code and allow new capital to take priority over all old creditors, including secured ones. This gives an extra incentive to lend to distressed businesses allowing an injection of fresh capital in the chain.

With a prepackaged bankruptcy a firm negotiates a reorganization plan with its creditors prior to filing for bankruptcy. Given the advance negotiation with creditors, a court hearing can be scheduled quickly, leading to a quick exit from bankruptcy.

Another approach, so far untested, is the adoption of “super bankruptcy,” a temporary tool to be used when a country faces systemic bankruptcy. It consists in keeping in place the management, so as to exploit its better knowledge of the firm, and forcing a

> 21 It is worth to notice that letters of credit were actually introduced to deal with this problem and ensure enforceable contract.

19
<!-- Start of picture text --> HHH Sup a<br>HHH Sec. =<br>HHH Fund. fA-<br>N Women OLF in HH CY<br>N Children 7<br>Never Married |<br>Superior |$i\<br>Secondary ES]<br>Fund. {AE<br>155,65] a<br>[45,54] |<br>[35,44] a<br>[25,34] ‘Ay<br>A -3 +2 ) ml 2<br><!-- End of picture text -->

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taxes would be passed on by intermediaries to consumers. Even if there were such a pass-through or trickle down, it is not clear that a reduction in indirect taxes is a good policy for helping the poor. For a start, reductions in indirect taxes rates can have significant fiscal costs and lead to cuts in pro-poor spending (IMF 2008). Furthermore, if a large share of targeted food items is consumed by the non-poor, other policy instruments to help the poor cope with the crisis may have a stronger impact on poverty reduction at a lower cost.

Wodon et al. (2008b) estimate to what extent the poor are likely to benefit from a reduction in indirect taxes. The authors provide data on the consumption of various imported foods for the same set of West and Central African countries discussed earlier. The analysis is focused on rice, flour and bread, maize, vegetable oil, sugar, and milk, because these are food items that tend to be imported to a large extent. Table 1 provides results for rice. The most important variable in the table is the share of a staple’s consumption that is accounted for by the poor. Indeed, the higher this share is, the more likely it is that a reduction in the price of the good following a reduction in indirect taxes will help in reducing poverty (on the impact of indirect tax reforms on poverty, see Makdissi and Wodon 2002, and Duclos et al. 2008). The share of the population that is poor varies between countries (from 28.5% in Ghana to 71.3% in the Democratic Republic of Congo according to recent poverty assessments completed at the World Bank), so that for cross-country comparisons, it is easier to consider the share of total consumption accounted for by the bottom 40% or 60% of the population (these two proportions were chosen because for most countries, the poverty rate falls between these two values).

Consider the share of rice consumption in the bottom 40% of the population. This share varies from 11% in Mali to 32% in Sierra Leone. This means that if one considers the bottom 40% as the poor, out of every dollar spent by a government for reducing indirect taxes on rice, and assuming that the indirect tax cuts results in a proportionate reduction in consumer prices, only about 20 cents will benefit the poor on average. In Guinea for example, the share of rice that is consumed by the bottom 40% of the population is only 23%. In Liberia, the share is at 22%. If the bottom 60% of the population is considered as poor, the share of subsidies or tax reductions that would reach the poor would be higher, at 25%-54%, but this still does not suggest good targeting. For most of the other imported foods for which indirect tax cuts have been implemented or considered by governments, the proportions of those foods consumed by the poor tend to be even lower than what is observed in Table 2 for rice.
<!-- Start of picture text --> WW L_—___<£_£<br>=<br>(OO TTT lL<br>0 20 40 60 80 100<br>Percentage of firms<br>@ No green investment @ One type @ Two types<br>@ Three types @ Four types @ Five types<br>@ Six types @ Seven types @ Eight types<br>@ Nine types @ Ten types<br><!-- End of picture text --> <!-- Start of picture text --> Ord lsDDD _<br>CA<br>MENA EE<br>0 20 40 60 80 100<br>Percentage of firms<br>@ No green investment<br>@ Capital-intensive green investment only<br><!-- End of picture text -->

- ® Non-capital-intensive green investment

- @ Capital- and non-capital-intensive green investment
<mark>top 10 percent’s income level increased by roughly 8.7 percent cumulatively despite an average GDP cumulative collapse of roughly 8.4 percent. This is based on a reduced sample of 8 cases for which data on income shares by percentile were available from surveys.</mark> <mark>Our results echo with parts of different strands of the literature studying the relationship between output declines and sovereign default. Some works have found defaults and debt crises to be succeeded by significant and lasting economic contractions (Reinhart and Rogoff 2009, Furceri and Zdzienicka 2012, Medas et al. 2018, Rewilak, 2018, Kuvshinov and Zimmermann 2019, Esteves et al. 2021, Arellano et al. 2018), others find the impact of sovereign default on output to be less so (Borenzstein and Panizza 2009; Sturzenegger and Zettelmeyer 2005; Tomz and Wright, 2007) or find sovereign defaults to occur following a decline in economic output or at the trough of a recession (Levy-Yeyati and Panizza 2011). Trebesch and Zabel (2017) build on an earlier literature differentiating between types of default (Eichengreen, 1991; Obstfeld and Taylor, 2003) and show that part of this divergence is likely driven by fundamental differences between defaults. We find that the output collapse in level terms is relatively short-lived with growth returning in short order, yet, and importantly, our study also finds declines relative to the counterfactual to be of a staggering magnitude on average.</mark> <mark>Our findings thus have important consequences for the theoretical literature of default. The vast majority of the dynamic equilibrium models on sovereign default assume the cost of default to be lump-sum, typically calibrating models assuming an output loss of 2 percent for each year of default (Arellano and Ramanarayanan, 2012; Aguiar and Gopinath, 2006; Yue, 2010;</mark> <mark>Hatchondo and Martinez, 2012; Chatterjee and Eyigungor, 2012; Aguiar et al., 2013; Cole et al., 2016, among others). Showing that the cost of default is time-variant and significantly greater in the first years of default implies the need to consider discount factors and default duration expectations inside a policy maker’s decision function.</mark> <mark>We also contribute to the literature on synthetic controls in the context of multiple treatment units and heterogeneous treatment events by further developing on the aggregation methodology first proposed by Cavallo et al. (2013), introducing weights based on the pre-treatment fit of</mark> 7
RENT CONTROL IN KUMASI, GHANA 6 The private sector has always provided a majority of the housing in the city. Government direct activity has been limited to 4,400 small houses, now mostly sold to their occupants. These houses have been very expensive to build, and the government recognizes that any solution to housing problems will require active private investment.

This study demonstrates that rent levels have contributed to the poor state of housing in Kumasi in 1986, the date of our data collection, and by extension to 1989. However there are also severe problems in obtaining the - inputs to housing developed land at affordable prices, building materials and finance. Improving the functioning of the rental market will also require concerted efforts on these other problems.

Housing conditions in Kumasi are bad, even given low incomes. Occupancy rates and the percentage of households living in one only room are both high. There are fewer single person households than in the past, and the high cost area is becoming more like the rest of the city, with respect to household size distribution, incomes and levels of crowding, than it was in 1980. However, while the building of additional houses have failed to keep up with growth in the population, there have been sufficient additional rooms to maintain the mean occupancy rate at a high but steady 3.3 persons per room since 1980.

There has been a reduction in the proportion of stock available for rental since 1980. Landlords have been replacing rent paying tenants with family members who live rent-free to such an extent that the percentage of family house tenants has doubled in the 1980 to 1986 period. There has, i&^wcvev, been little transfer to commercial or other non-residential uses.

Landlords differ little from renters except in the amount of housing they are able to consume. Their incomes are little higher than those of renters per household and they are actually lower per capita owing to their greater household size. However, as owner households tend to occupy a larger number of rooms than renters, their occupancy rates tend to be lower. They also have better access to water supply, toilets and other facilities in the house.

There is a generally low expectation of rent levels among both landlords and renters. Rents are only about half of the market price for which the unit would rent in tha absence of rent control, so low in fact that they are imposing considerable welfare costs on society as a whole. Rent control is inefficient in the sense that the costs imposed by rent control on landlords are not all captured by tenants as benefits. This efficiency loss is severe in some sectors of the Kumasi housing market. Generally, rent control imposes a welfare cost which exceeds the overall benefit to tenants.

More specific _quantitative_ results include the following:

# Housing Market Conditions

Ninety percent of Kumasi's population rent or live as tenants in family houses. Our 1986 household survey showed that typical controlled rents were less than 2 percent of total consumption. We identified a subsample of "uncontrolled" units (units whose rents exceed controlled levels) and found
|**Tabl**|**e B6: Control of Corruption**|
|---|---|
|**Code**|**Concept Measured**|
|**Repr**<br>|**esentative Sources**<br>|
|**BRI**|I<sup>_nternal Causes of Political Risk_ </sup>: Mentality, including xenophobia, nationalism, corruption, nepotism, willingness to compromise|
||Indirect Diversion of Funds|
|**DRI**|Losse s and Costs of Corruption|
|**EIU**|Corruption|
|**GAD**|Cronyism|
||Government Efforts to Tackle Corruption|
|**GCS**|Public trust in financial honesty of politicians|
||Diversion of public funds due to corruption is common|
||Frequent for firms to make extra payments connected to: import/export permits|
||Frequent for firms to make extra payments connected to: public utilities|
||Frequent for firms to make extra payments connected to tax payments|
||Frequent for firms to make extra payments connected to: awarding of public contract s|
||Frequent for firms to make extra payments connected to: getting favorable judicial decisions|
||Extent to which firms' illegal payments to influence government policies impose costs on other firms|
|**GWP**|Is corruption in government widespread?|
|**IPD**|Corruption|
|**PRS**|_Corruption._Measures corruption within the political system, which distorts the economic and financial environment, reduces the efficiency of<br>government and business by enabling people to assu me positions of power through patronage rather than ability, and introduces an<br>inherently instability in the political system.|
|**WMO**|_Corruption_: This index assesses the intrusiveness of the country’s bureaucracy. The amount of red tape like ly to countered is assessed, as is<br>the likelihood of encountering corrupt officials and other groups.|
|**Non-r**|**epresentative Sources**|
|**ADB**|Transparency / corruption|
|**AFR**|How many elected leaders (parliamentarians or local councilors) do you think are involved in corruption?|
||How many judges and magist rates do you think are involved in corruption?<br>How many government officials do you think are involved in corruption?|
||How many border/tax officials do you think are involved in corruption?|
|**ASD**|Anti-corruption|
|**BPS**|How common is for firms to have to pay irregular additional payments to get things done|
||On average, what percent of total annual sales do firms pay in unofficial payments to public officials|
||How problematic is corruption for the growth of your business.|
||Frequency of bribery in taxes, customs and judiciary|
|**BTI**|Corruption|
|**CCR**<br>|Transparency / corruption<br>|
|**CPIA**|Transparency / corruption|
|**FRH**|Corruption|
|**GCB**|Frequency of corruption among political parties, government officials, parliament, media and judiciary|
||Frequency of household bribery|
|**GII**|<br>Anti-Corruption Agency|
|**IFD**|<br>Accountability, transparency and corruption in rural areas|
|**LBO**|Have you heard of act s of corruption?|
|**PRC**|Corruption Index|
|**VAB**|Frequency of corruption among government officials|
|**WCY**|Bribing and corruption exist in the economy|

79
and 2005 BEEPS.<sup>27</sup> Figures reported represent means (or proportions, in the last two columns), weighting each of the 27 countries equally.<sup>28</sup> The most dramatic improvement between 2002 and 2005 is in the “bribe tax,” which fell by one-third from 1.6% of firm revenues to 1.1%. The bribe tax reported is skewed across firms, with a majority of firms reporting 0% in both years. A positive value for “bribe tax” was reported by 44% of firms in 2002, declining to 37% in 2005.<sup>29</sup> Among the numerous other questions on corruption issues in the BEEPS, most show evidence of modest improvement. For example, corruption was cited as a major or moderate obstacle to doing business by 21% of firms on average in 2002, falling to about 18% in 2005. About 26% of firms on average in 2002 reported that paying bribes was frequently, usually or always necessary “to get things done with regard to customs, taxes, licenses” etc., down to 20% in 2005. Most questions about specific public services also show evidence of declines in the incidence of bribe paying, e.g. in getting connected to public utilities, in obtaining licenses, and in paying taxes and customs.

A few corruption items in the BEEPS show slight deteriorations over time for the region overall. Bribe-paying in obtaining government contracts and in dealing with courts appears to have increased very slightly between 2002 and 2005.

> 27 Based on BEEPS 2005 data, Anderson and Gray (2006) report corruption levels for 2005, and changes between 2002 and 2005.  Using BEEPS 2002 data, Gray, Hellman and Ryterman (2004) report corruption levels for 2002, and changes between 1999 and 2002.  Fewer changes in BEEPS contents and methods occurred in the 2005 survey than in the 2002 survey, making over-time comparisons for 2002 and 2005 more reliable than comparisons between 1999 and 2002.  For example, the “bribe tax” question was worded differently in 1999 and 2002, but identically in 2002 and 2005.  Serbia/Montenegro and Tajikistan were added to the survey in 2002, so can be included in comparisons of BEEPS II and III, but not of BEEPS I and II.

> 28 Only 26 countries are included in the “bribe tax” comparison, as there were problems with data for Turkey in 2005.

> 29 The question asked “what percent of total annual sales do firms like yours typically pay,” which should elicit more candid responses than if it were phrased specifically in terms of the respondent’s firm.

28
||of the time, 3=some of the time, 4=none/almost none of<br>the time (note that this variable is increasing in_lack of_<br>_stress,_so a negative correlation between this variable and<br>another characteristic would be equivalent to a positive<br>correlation between stress and that other characteristic)|
|---|---|
|**satisfaction_01**|How satisfied the worker is with the current job.<br>1=satisfied/very satisfied, 0=unsatisfied/very unsatisfied.|
|**contract1**|Works with contract, no fixed time period. 1=yes, 0=no|
|**contract2**|Works with contract, fixed time period. 1=yes, 0=no|
|**wage**|hourly wage for those that are employed in private sector or<br>the government and the hourly wage equivalent for those<br>that earn profit from self‐employment. This variable is<br>derived using data on monthly earnings and hours worked.<br>As this variable may suffer from measurement error, we<br>also report the median monthly wage.|

Descriptive statistics for job characteristics are presented in the following tables‐ Table 1‐ Job characteristics correlations for youth (includes the number of observations, and significance starred at the 5% level, with youth being defined as those aged 15‐24). Table 2‐ Job characteristics correlations for adults (defined as those aged over 24) Table 3‐ Job characteristics correlations for all ages Table 4‐ Characteristics by occupation category for youth Table 5‐ Characteristics by occupation category for adults

**Table 1 –** (number of observations reported below correlations)

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