In this paper we empirically study the relation between public debt and economic growth. We analyze how the public debt to GDP ratio at a certain point in time is correlated with the GDP growth rate in the following period, where we consider a one-year time span, a three-years time interval and a five-years interval. Using panel data comprising seven developed countries from 1970-2012, we estim...

This paper studies the relationship between public debt and economic growth for selected emerging markets performing panel data estimations. Several regressor variables are included, but the main focus is on public debt. The results reveal a significant positive correlation between public debt and the subsequent growth rate of per capita GDP. Population and investment also yield a significant p...

In addition to transferring about 16 percent of GDP from exporters to importers, Uzbekistan’s quasi-fiscal multiple exchange rate regime generates identifiable welfare losses of 2–8 percent of GDP on import markets and up to 15 percent on export markets. These excess burdens have increased substantially with the growing difference among exchange rates. The welfare analysis allows some conclusio...

Cross-country data on energy consumption, GDP and vulnerability are used to measure percentage changes in vulnerability associated with percentage changes in per capita GDP and per capita energy consumption. Energy consumption, through its nonlinear effects on per capita income, have the effect of reducing a country’s overall vulnerability to climate change by a greater amount at moderate incom...

We find that trade and domestic market size are robust determinants of economic growth over the 1960-1996 period when trade openness is measured as the US dollar value of imports and exports relative to GDP in PPP US$ (“real openness”). When trade openness is measured as the US dollar value of imports and exports relative to GDP in exchange rate US$ (“nominal openness”) however, trade and the s...

The aim of this paper is to analyze the shadow economy in the Spanish Autonomous Communities. In so doing, we employ the Currency Demand Approach to analyze the 1987–2010 period. The results show that the size of the shadow economy ranges from 18% to 30% of regional GDP and an approximate mean value of 25% for the entire territory. The Personal Income Tax has the greatest impact on the shadow e...

Our analysis of 19 OECD countries over the period 1972-2006 provides evidence of convergence in per capita health care expenditures for 17 countries, while the US and (to a lesser degree) Norway follow a different path. A simple decomposition of per capita health expenditures reveals that the divergence of the US comes from the divergence of the ‘health care expenditure over GDP’ component, whi...

International evidence indicates that higher terms of trade levels and lower terms of trade volatility contribute to enhanced growth outcomes, especially for commodity-export and developing countries. New Zealand’s terms of trade have been high and remarkably stable since the early 1990s compared with past experience. We analyse the proximate reasons behind these high, stable terms of trade and...