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In many successful late-industrializing countries in the 20th century, business groups with operating units in technologically unrelated industries have acted as the microeconomic agent of growth. This paper explores why this business form has characterized countries which industrialized 'late', and why this form succeeded in the early phases of catching up whereas the advanced-country conglomerate has had an undistinguished performance. The paper uses internal resource-base theories of the firm to explore the significance of organizational knowledge and resulting increasing returns in the group form which, even in mature markets and especially in late industrialization, constitute a sustainable source of competitiveness. In the case of late industrialization foreign technology acquisition capability became a necessary condition for corporate success. In the best diversified business groups this capability was transformed into organizational know-how that provided a key resource in the effectiveness of corporate growth through diversification. The first two parts of the paper briefly survey diversified industrial groups in historical contexts and then across a broad array of late-industrializing countries. Then the paper considers why diversification was not prevalent among firms attempting to catch up in earlier historical periods, why the strategy of leading late-industrializing firms was one of diversification rather than specialization and why their chosen diversification path was one involving technologically unrelated industries. This is followed by the core argument of the paper about the transformation of technology acquisition into a competitive asset and illustrated with evidence from South Korea. Finally, the paper analyzes why the behavior of the lateindustrializing group differs from that of the American conglomerate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although derived from the USDA economy food plan, the Federal poverty thresholds have no real basis in a criterion of nutritional adequacy, but are a relative measure of poverty, suggesting that biological minima cannot be used to define poverty in a developed country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study adjudicates between two competing perspectives regarding the importance of manufacturing employment for economic growth with the onset of the most recent round of economic globalization. Established economic theories link shifts toward industrial activities to higher growth due to increases in aggregate productivity. While some scholars argue that the global restructuring of manufacturing in the era of globalization presents novel opportunities for development in the South, others suggest that the importance of manufacturing employment for economic growth in less developed countries declines during this period as competitive pressures increase and barriers to entry decline. I use difference models and a broad sample of both developed and less developed countries in the time period 1970-2010 to examine the effects of manufacturing share of employment on economic growth and how these effects have changed over time. First, I find that manufacturing employment has strong positive effects on economic growth net of neoclassical controls for all countries. Second, I find that for less developed countries, the importance of manufacturing share of employment for growth has declined through the course of the time period studied, particularly after 1990. In contrast, my results do not show a similar decline for developed countries. These findings are robust across alternative estimation strategies. I conclude by considering the theoretical implications of these results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Do populations grow as countries become richer? In this study we estimate the effects on population growth of shocks to national income that are plausibly exogenous and unlikely to be driven by technological change. For a panel of over 139 countries spanning the period 1960-2007, we interact changes in international oil prices with countries' average net-export shares of oil in GDP. Controlling for country and time fixed effects, we find that this measure of oil price induced income growth is positively associated with population growth. The IV estimates indicate that a 1 percentage point increase in GDP per capita growth over a 10-year period increases countries' population growth by around 0.1 percentage points. Furthermore, we find that this population effect results from both a positive effect on fertility and a negative effect on infant and child mortality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study argues that a central factor in the determinants of citizen attitudes toward trade is the social psychology of the individual in question. Namely, we contend that the level of social trust an individual has will condition the degree to which an individual wants to open her country to imports from other countries. Those individuals with lower relative levels of social trust are less likely to support the notion of freer trade. We base this contention on the logic that those people who are distrustful of people in general are more likely to distrust that which comes from people who are unknown to them, such as goods coming into their country from abroad. This argument is a departure from previous studies of public attitudes toward trade, which have focused on various economic utilitarian considerations and xenophobia that shape citizen attitudes toward trade liberalization. To test our argument, we employ data from the 1995-1997 wave of the World Values Survey. Using a logit regression analysis, we find, as predicted, that the more social trust an individual has, the more likely that person is to support the idea of liberalized trade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article tests systematically the effect of political structures on the credibility of sovereign debtors in advanced economies. It argues that power-sharing and party system polarization have important effects on long-term interest rates. Where collective responsibility is high and polarization is low, the market perceives a more credible commitment on the part of sovereign debtors. These arguments derived from the theory of credible commitments perform much better than alternative accounts of the politics of sovereign debt, namely a market preference for right-wing governments and more flexible polities. The principal data consist of a panel of 23 rich countries between 1970 and 2009. There are tests for robustness to a wider sample and a variety of different measurements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyse the determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) by multinational enterprises (MNEs), in developed economies (DCs). We compare between EU and non-EU DCs, in the context of an estimated equation derived from economic theory, which compares the main demand and supply-side determinants of FDI. We contribute to the literature in three ways. First, by comparing between European and non-European DCs. Second, by employing different proxies for the determinants in question. Third, by testing for the relative importance of total factor productivity (TFP) as a determinant of FDI in the two sets of countries. Our results are in line with theoretical predictions, but point to the special importance of TFP as a determinant par excellence of FDI in DCs. They also highlight differences even within developed, European and non-European counties. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses the "Varieties of Capitalism" (VoC) approach to comparative studies of the economic institutions of developed countries, in terms of its usefulness in explaining variations in gender inequality. The limited amount of VoC literature that considers gender issues is examined for its attention to two issues: women's access to employment (their rate of participation in the labor force), and employment conditions for women in the labor market, including occupational sex segregation.

Increasing legalization of international institutions has divergent effects on member countries. Whereas legalization decreases uncertainty and increases convergence of countries’ expectations on international outcomes, it imposes costs on countries by increasing the complexity and difficulty of procedures for them to utilize. Countries with the administrative capacity to follow elaborate procedures reap the benefits of increased legalization. For countries without such capacity—primarily developing countries—the potential benefits are offset by their difficulty in following the procedures. I examine this argument against the institutional changes in dispute settlement procedures that occurred in the transition from the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Compared to the GATT era, developed countries—ones with greater capacity—are much more likely to utilize dispute settlement in the WTO than developing countries. Gains from the institutional changes in dispute settlement procedures have accrued to benefit mostly developed member countries in the WTO. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a debate on whether some forms of financial flows offer better protection against crises than others. Using a large panel data set that includes advanced, emerging, and developing economies during 1970-2003, this article analyzes the behavior of several types of flows: foreign direct investment (FDI), portfolio equity investment, portfolio debt investment, other flows to the official sector, other flows to banks, and other flows to the nonbank private sector. Differences across types of flows are limited with respect to volatility, persistence, cross-country comovement, and correlation with growth at home or in the world economy. However, consistent with conventional wisdom, FDI is the least volatile form of financial flow, when the average size of net or gross flows is taken into account. The differences are striking during "sudden stops" in financial flows (defined as drops in total net financial inflows of more than percentage points of GDP compared with the previous year). In such episodes, FDI is remarkably stable, and portfolio equity seems to play a limited role. Portfolio debt experiences a reversal, though it recovers relatively quickly, and other flows (including bank loans and trade credit) experience severe drops and often remain depressed for a few years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evaluates the sensitivity of the natural rate of growth to the actual rate of growth for series of developed countries over the period 1961 to 1995. Changes in economic growth; Causality between national output and factor inputs; Importance of supply and demand in understanding the growth rate differences between countries.

In the aggregate, the competitive thrust of the exports of manufactures from the newly industrialising countries (NICs) is very small. In none of the advanced OECD countries has total penetration by less developed countries' exports of manufactures yet exceeded 2 % of Gross Domestic Product This paper argues a somewhat different view, however. The thesis here is that, because of the great differences between the industry and company structures among different sectors of NIC interest, the adjust-versus-protect responses of the industrialised countries have been, and will continue to be, highly differentiated by industry. And this can occur under a very wide range of high or low growth macroeconomic assumptions. The view here is that the adjustment process as played out in the real world is not only, indeed not mainly, a macroeconomic, market process; but rather a series of microeconomic 'games'. The players in those games have certain characteristics, predispositions and stakes. An understanding of these 'structural' factors could well lead to better forecasts and policy plans than just knowing whether those games will be played in the surroundings of a more or less agreeable business climate. This paper attempts to establish a number of propositions. Not all may have been demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt, but then the task of further research may be to test and refine them. To sum up what may be summed up: Macroeconomic analysis is not a sufficient tool with which to predict the intensity, geographical locus, or sectoral distribution of adjustment resistance. Conventional microeconomic analysis may offer only a little more of a guide: all the sectors here have been under threat, yet protect versus adjust responses have varied widely - and appear likely to do so in the future. Industry structure matters. Ability to scan multinationally, ability to act on multinational information (i.e., not be a state-owned national champion), experience with product... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BRICS is an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa and has emerged as the symbol of the shift in global economic power, developing at a faster pace than industrialized countries. BRICS accounted for 53% of the entire global GDP growth during the period 2007–2010 and, in the next 40 years, as much as 80% of the world's economic growth will come from emerging market countries. Despite the fact that infrastructure in BRICS has improved markedly in recent years, these countries have not created a modern, broad healthcare system as encountered in the G7 industrialized countries and extensive regional differences in health expenditure exist between them. Nevertheless, the BRICS countries are quickly taking the lead in encouraging innovation, simplifying devices and processes and applying newer technologies that are more adapted to consumers' needs and less costly. Cardiovascular surgery in the BRICS countries remains far lower when compared with the G7 countries and the cardiovascular surgical training also varies widely. However, this huge shift in the global economy and the regional discrepancies might represent a unique opportunity for co-operation, interaction and partnership to integrate cardiovascular societies and surgeons all over the globe for the best care of our patients: surely it will contribute to making our world more egalitarian, fairer and better. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]