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Call for papers
Conference: Better Jobs for DevelopmentAdditional call for papers for the third Jobs and Development Conference, which will held online on 1-4 September 2020. The deadline for submissions is 10 July 2020.
Blog
Is COVID-19 really an exogenous shock?"We cannot solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." – Albert Einstein Economists invariably divide shocks into two types: endogenous and exogenous...
COVID-19 Economics shocksBackground Note
Making a COVID-19 vaccine globally available once developed: Decoupling production of the vaccine from its developmentDevelopment and production of a COVID-19 vaccine There is a high risk that the intellectual property (IP) rights of a COVID-19 vaccine will effectively block people in many poorer countries from accessing it...
COVID-19 COVID-19 vaccine Intellectual propertyWorking Paper
Precarity and the pandemic: COVID-19 and poverty incidence, intensity, and severity in developing countriesThis paper makes a set of estimates for the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on poverty incidence, intensity, and severity in developing countries and on the distribution of global poverty...
COVID-19 crisis global povertyArticle
UNU-WIDER ongoing work on the effect of COVID-19 on the economies, states, and societies of the Global SouthIt is clear that COVID-19 will have serious implications for economies, states, and societies of the Global South. At UNU-WIDER we are reorienting our work to think through what those implications are and possible mitigation and adaptation measures...
Research Brief
Background Note
COVID-19 and the socioeconomic impact in Africa: The case of GhanaThe first two cases of COVID-19 were reported in Ghana on 12 March 2020 by the health ministry...
COVID-19 economic impact GhanaJournal Article
Inequality by population groups and income sources: Accounting for inequality changes in Spain during the recessionI discuss a new approach which decomposes inequality into the contributions of population groups by income sources...
Decomposition Recession Earnings inequalityJournal Article
Vulnerability to natural shocks: Assessing the short-term impact on consumption and poverty of the 2015 flood in MozambiqueMozambique is among the most disaster-prone countries in the world. A bigger than usual, and mostly unexpected, flood occurred in the central-northern region of the country in the first few months of 2015, causing huge damage to infrastructures...
Welfare impact Flood Difference-in-differenceWorking Paper
COVID-19: macroeconomic dimensions in the developing worldThe COVID-19 pandemic represents an unprecedented global crisis. The task for economic policy is to help keep people alive, enterprises afloat, and households out of poverty. The pandemic has macroeconomic dimensions...
commodities COVID-19 DebtsWorking Paper
Africa’s lockdown dilemma: High poverty and low trustThe primary policy response to suppress the spread of COVID-19 in high-income countries has been to lock down large sections of the population...
COVID-19 lockdown measures lockdown policiesBlog
Who gets to work from home?: A suddenly relevant indicator of privilege and inequality in labour market outcomes
The COVID-19 pandemic constitutes an unprecedented shock for labour markets around the world. Non-pharmaceutical interventions, such as social distancing, and limits on economic activity and mobility of people, are a necessary response...
Journal Article
Tax-motivated transfer mispricing in South Africa: Direct evidence using transaction dataThis paper provides the first direct systematic evidence of profit shifting through transfer mispricing in a developing country...
Tax International taxation Profit shiftingAbout
2019 UNU-WIDER Summer SchoolUNU-WIDER, in collaboration with the Development Policy Research Unit (DPRU) at University of Cape Town (UCT), held a two-week intensive summer school on applied labour economics during 18-29 November 2019. Find below blogs from particpants, photos...
Capacity building Labour market Labour market participation
Blog
The end of poverty postponed?: Over a billion people living in poverty and a $500 million per day loss of income for the poorest people in the world could soon be realityThe COVID-19 pandemic continues to dominate headlines as the death toll rises and economies falter...
COVID-19 global poverty global poverty increaseBlog
COVID-19 and lockdowns: Are women more affected?
Globally, governments are using lockdowns to contain the spread of COVID-19. This has disproportionately affected the poor, the homeless, and the migrants who are left without livelihoods, especially where the lockdown is country-wide, as in India...
Journal Article
The Determinants of Redistribution around the WorldThis study re-examines the determinants of redistribution in light of improved data and methods relative to earlier literature...
Cross-country analysis Growth Inequality
Conference
Achieving Sustainable Development in the Least Developed Countries - Towards LDC-VThis event is postponed to 12-14 May 2021. More information will be provided on this page soon.
Working Paper
COVID-19: mortality, future years lost, and demographic structure: Italy and Kenya comparedCOVID-19 causes extremely high mortality among the old...
age structure COVID-19 future years lost
Working Paper
The global distribution of routine and non-routine workStudies of the effects of technology and globalization on employment and inequality commonly assume that occupations are identical around the world in the job tasks they require...
de-routinization Economic development global division of labourWorking Paper
A comparative study of export processing zones in the wake of the Sustainable Development Goals: The cases of Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, and ZimbabweThe objective of this research is to assess the extent to which export processing zones in Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe integrate the Sustainable Development Goals in their implementation and operations...
export processing zones Sustainable development BotswanaBackground Note
COVID-19 and socioeconomic impact in Africa: The case of South AfricaWhat has the government of South Africa done with respect to COVID-19 measures of mitigation and suppression? The first COVID-19 positive case was confirmed on 5 March 2020...
COVID-19 South Africa government actionWorking Paper
Special economic zones in Southern Africa: Is success influenced by design attributes?Special economic zones (SEZs) in Africa are generally regarded as underperforming relative to their peers in the rest of the world. This study focuses on the design features of the SEZ in Africa that may help explain this underperformance...
design attributes geographic areas implementationBlog
Welfare works: redistribution is the way to create less violent, less unequal societies
In his presidential address to the Royal Economic Society in 1996, the late Professor Anthony Atkinson famously called for discussion of inequality and income distribution to be brought ' in from the cold '...
Blog
From small beginnings, big impact
2020 marks the 35th year of UNU-WIDER’s impact in the sphere of development economics...
Creating, strengthening, and sharing knowledge for development Over the period 2019–23 UNU-WIDER research will focus on the interlinked development challenges of transforming economies, states, and societies. These transformations are central...
