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In this study, we examine the importance of multifactor productivity (MFP) growth in goods and services for U.S. States during 1980-2007 by applying the dual growth accounting framework. We find that MFP growth was relatively high and converged in the goods sector, but was low and did not converge in services. Although low growth in MFP in services was due to declining real user cost, particularly in real estate services, the lack of convergence itself was due to variation in wage growth. We also document that while the gap between productivity and wage growth was higher in goods, the two series were more strongly correlated in services. Finally, states with higher initial human capital experienced higher growth in both sectors. (JEL O47, R11), I. INTRODUCTION The study of income and productivity convergence, and structural transformation are central and recurring themes in economic growth research. The U.S. states have been a fertile testing ground [...]

The financial crisis in East Asia generated a revival of interest in the merits of financial openness. The ensuing debate on the benefits of openness has focused more on short and medium run issues than on the long run effects. Within the empirical literature on economic growth, little or no attention has been paid to the effects of financial openness. Contrary to the orthodox position, the few results that exist suggest that capital controls have no effect on economic growth. This paper argues that this conclusion emerges from a failure to account for underlying differences across countries with similar degrees of capital controls. We show that the degree of ethnic and linguistic heterogeneity in a country plays a significant role in explaining the effects of controls on economic growth. For countries with relatively higher degrees of ethnic heterogeneity, the effects are particularly adverse whereas for countries with high degrees of homogeneity, capital controls actually have a net positive effect on economic growth. On balance, more developing countries suffered due to controls than not. Within the sample of 57 non-OECD countries that did implement controls for the period 1975-1995, as many as 39 saw a reduction in their growth rates. This result is robust to a number of variables commonly used in the economic growth regressions. JEL classification: F21; F43; O24; O40 Keywords: Economic growth; Capital controls; Rent seeking; Ethno-linguistic fractionalization; Openness

In this paper, we examine the various links among foreign direct investment (FDI), financial markets, and economic growth. We explore whether countries with better financial systems can exploit FDI more efficiently. Empirical analysis, using cross-country data between 1975 and 1995, shows that FDI alone plays an ambiguous role in contributing to economic growth. However, countries with well-developed financial markets gain significantly from FDI. The results are robust to different measures of financial market development, the inclusion of other determinants of economic growth, and consideration of endogeneity. Keywords: Foreign direct investment; Capital markets; Credit markets; Economic growth; Spillovers JEL classification: F23; F36; F43; O16

Byline: Areendam Chanda (1), Louis Putterman (2) Keywords: economic growth; economic development; comparative economic systems Abstract: In this paper, an index of the depth of experience with state-level institutions, or state antiquity, is derived for a large set of countries. We show that state antiquity is significantly correlated with measures of political stability and institutional quality, with income per capita, and with the rate of economic growth between 1960 and 1995. State antiquity contributes significantly to the explanation of differences in growth rates, explaining half of the differences in growth rates between countries like China and Mauritania, which are located at the two ends of the spectrum. It is also a good instrument for 'social infrastructure,' which explains cross-country differences in worker productivity. Author Affiliation: (1) Department of Economics, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 (2) Department of Economics, Brown University, Providence, RI, 02912 Article History: Registration Date: 12/10/2004

Early states like China and India have been experiencing more rapid economic growth in recent decades. We show that more rapid growth by early starters has been the norm in economic history, and that the “reversal of fortune” associated with the European overseas expansion was both exceptional and temporary. Not only was the post-1500 reversal in the process of being reversed after 1960, but also the advantage conferred by early development in the latter period was considerably greater than the growth rate disadvantage that it conferred during 1500–1960, implying a rapid undoing of the first reversal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We construct an overlapping generations model to study the effect of capital controls on human capital investments and the incidence of redistributive taxation in a growing economy. We argue that the conventional wisdom linking higher capital controls to lower growth is reproduced only when an economy is sufficiently developed. For under-developed countries, higher capital controls are beneficial for human capital as well as domestic physical capital accumulation suggesting that the conventional wisdom does not apply. In an augmented version of the model, we show that a modern sector characterized by positive levels of investment in education may not exist unless capital controls are sufficiently high. Higher capital controls make it feasible for a modern sector to exist by lowering the threshold income level required by workers to invest in human capital. Our results are consistent with recent evidence suggesting that capital account liberalization positively affects growth only after a country has achieved a certain threshold level of absorptive capacities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]