Banks Banking category: 2128 books

The authors examine the numerous structural and policy changes Indian authorities have adopted since the 1991 balance of payments crisis; how these changes helped India weather the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98; the risks to fiscal sustainability and their implications for growth; the challenges...

This volume, by Bijan B. Aghevli, Tamim Bayoumi, and Guy Meredith, is based on a seminar on structural change in Japan held in early 1997 and chaired by the IMF's First Deputy Managing Director, Stanley Fischer. Discussion of teh day-to-day management of the standard levers of fiscal and monetary policy...

This volume examines how Japan should cope with its daunting fiscal challenges. As the Japanese economy finally emerges from a long period of weak growth and falling prices burdened by record-high public debt, fiscal adjustment has taken center stage in the policy agenda and the public debate. Growing...

China's economic performance hs been remarkable since the the reform process began 15 years ago. Notwithstanding the achievements that have been made, a number of serious problems remain. This papers discusses the current reform program and the effors being made to overcome the structural impediments to growth.

The Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) is used by the IMF to provide support for countries’ implementation of their poverty reduction and growth strategies. A key requirement in the design of PRGF programs is understanding the effects of reform program measures on vulnerable groups—particularly...

This is the first of a group of papers dealing with various aspects of Fund-supported adjustment programs. The other two, The Global Effects of Fund-supported Adjustment Programs by Morris Goldstein and Fund-Supported Programs, Fiscal Policy, and Income Distribution by the Fiscal Affairs Department, will also be published in the Fund's Occasional Paper Series.

This book provides a critique of the neoclassical explanations of the 2008 financial collapse, of the ensuing long recession and of the neoliberal austerity responses to it. The study argues that while the prevailing views of deregulation and financialization as instrumental culprits in the...

A survey of the complex and intertwined set of forces behind the various commodity markets and the interplay between these markets and the global economy. Summarizes a rich set of facts combined with in-depth analyses distillated in a nontechnical manner. Includes discussion of structural trends behind commodities markets, their future implications, and policy implications.

On January 1, 1991, the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic launched a comprehensive reform program designed to establish a market economy. This paper charts the progress of the reform program in the context of Czechoslovakia's prewar history as a major industrial power, its subsequent slow economic...

This volume presents the proceedings of a symposium that was orgainzed jointly by the IMF and the World Bank and held in Washington, D.C. The symposium was organized by Vittorio Corbo, Morris Goldstein, and Mohsin Khan. The papers review the design of, and the economic rationale behind, adjustment programs...

Adopted in 2001, the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) represents a new vision to place African countries on a path toward poverty reduction, sustainable growth, and full integration in the world economy. This conference volume includes papers selected from a high-level seminar in December...

The effect of exchange rate volatility on trade flows was examined by a 1984 IMF study on G-7 countries. Over the past two decades, many developments in the world economy, such as the currency crises in the 1990s and increasing cross-border capital flows, may have exacerbated exchange rate volatility,...

In economics, money illusion refers to the tendency of people to think of currency in nominal, rather than real, terms. In other words, the numerical/face value (nominal value) of money is mistaken for its purchasing power (real value). This is false, as modern fiat currencies have no inherent value...

The Arab Spring continues to spread throughout the Middle East, and it will end up transforming Islamic countries just as much as the two World Wars changed Europe. The Great Recession that began in 2008, along with defects in the global economic system, played a large role in the unrest. During...