Brazil and South Korea: Two Tales Of a Middle-Income Trap

June 9, 2021

The middle-income trap may well characterize the experience of Brazil and most of Latin America since the 1980s. Conversely, South Korea maintained its pace of evolution, reaching a high-income status. Such divergence of economic growth can be related to their distinctive performances of domestic accumulation of technological and organizational capabilities. Their different approaches to global value chains and trade globalization reinforced such discrepancy in domestic accumulation processes.

Speakers
Otaviano Canuto
Senior Fellow
Senior Fellow at the Policy Center for the New South, principal at Center for Macroeconomics and Development and non-resident fellow at Brookings Institute. Former Vice President and Executive Director at the World Bank, Executive Director at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Vice President at the Inter-American Development Bank. He was also Deputy Minister for international affairs at Brazil’s Ministry of Finance, as well as professor of economics at University of São Paulo (USP) and University of Campinas (UNICAMP). ...

RELATED CONTENT

  • Authors
    Raffaele Della Croce
    Miguel Vazquez
    September 29, 2021
    In order to close the financing gap in green technologies, finding new mechanisms to enhance the participation of the private sector, combined with that of the public sector, in financing sustainable and climate-resilient infrastructure is a must. In this context, some unlisted instruments are going to be needed to enhance financing of green infrastructure. Besides, the development of properly structured projects, with risks and returns in line with the preferences of the different ...
  • Authors
    September 22, 2021
    Face à la concurrence mondiale croissante, les Emirats arabes unis (EAU) ont pu constater le retard enregistré dans le domaine maritime dans les points stratégiques traditionnels au début du 21ème siècle. Pour autant, le pays détient une position importante sur la scène internationale en ce qui concerne le transport maritime. Grâce à la DP World, instrument diplomatique émirati, le lancement d’initiatives permettant au pays de regagner une place et une implantation dans différents p ...
  • Authors
    Pauline Weil
    September 14, 2021
    Concerns are real, but the country fares as well as peers at similar levels of development China holds a paradox: Western policy-makers and many firms decry discriminatory business practices — concerns that have culminated in a trade war between the US and China — yet foreign direct investment (FDI) in China continues to thrive. In the first quarter of this year, FDI into China soared by 40% compared to the same period a year prior and, as reported by Unctad, the country overtook t ...
  • September 14, 2021
    The major announcement of December 21, 2019, of the shift from the CFA franc to the Eco led to major changes in the monetary landscape and institutional setting of the West African states. This paper analyzes the benefits and challenges for economic and monetary cooperation in West Africa of this new development. While this new initiative has many advantages, establishing a new currency at the West African region, as a whole faces unresolved issues that may compromise its success. T ...
  • September 10, 2021
    The COVID-19 pandemic caused a shock to both demand and supply, leading to the biggest collapse in world output since the Great Depression. Since late 2020, a more rapid than expected recovery has been observed. Five questions arise frequently. Here is my take on those questions. 1- Is the pandemic receding? No, but we have a vaccine to control it, and are better at managing it with selective measures, as distinct from total lockdowns, which kill the economy. The global number of ...
  • September 10, 2021
    Le bilan des relations Europe/Méditerranée et Europe/Afrique invite aujourd’hui à un renouveau de ces partenariats. Un renouveau car il y a retrait partiel de l’Europe en ce qui concerne les questions de développement du voisinage Méditerranée-Afrique dans un temps où les partenariats actuels [de Barcelone et celui de Cotonou] s’emboitent dans la logique du commerce (libre-échange) et de l’aide financière. Le renouveau du partenariat Euro-méditerranée-Afrique devrait s’inscrire dans ...
  • Authors
    September 8, 2021
    We explore whether improved export sophistication increases women’s participation in wage employment. Using panel data from a large group of developing and emerging economies, and Fixed-effects and Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimators, we find that export sophistication has significant and mostly positive effects on women’s participation in paid employment in all regions, but these effects are nonlinear, since they become positive only after a threshold level of sophistica ...
  • September 6, 2021
    L’Union européenne (UE) a annoncé le 14 juillet une proposition de taxe carbone à ses frontières, qui devrait renchérir les importations de produits fortement émetteurs (acier, aluminium, ciment, électricité et engrais). Cette même taxe est déjà appliquée au sein de l’UE, qui veut désormais l’imposer aux fabricants étrangers. En soi, le projet part d’une bonne intention. Il n’est pas motivé par le protectionnisme, mais par des préoccupations climatiques on ne peut plus justiíées. S ...
  • September 1, 2021
    The world woke on Monday August 23 to higher international reserves for all countries. A new allocation of US$650 billion in Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to its member countries had entered into force (SDR450 billion). SDRs are an international reserve asset created by the IMF and added to countries' other foreign reserves. It is not a currency that can be used by private agents. Governments, on the other hand, can unconditionality exchan ...
  • August 24, 2021
    تجدون أقوى لحظات حديث الثلاثاء حول المواضيع الاقتصادية لهذه السنة : رؤى استشرافية لما بعد الجائحة، الاقتصاد غير المهيكل، دور القطاع الثالث، المغرب وسلاسل القيمة الاقليمية مع خبراء وباحثين اقتصادين ...