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

The concept of ‘developing country’ is now a source of controversy, asking “Is China a developing country?”, for example. The normative implications of such question will be considered, after a grief survey of its use in international organizations. Then, the transformation of the relations between States from asymmetric solidarity to symmetric complementarity is suggested. As an example of complementary relations, those between Morocco and Japan is surveyed. ...

En pleine transition ordonnée de son régime de change, sous l'autorité bienveillante du Fonds monétaire international (FMI), le Royaume du Maroc est un exemple très concret des avantages et des inconvénients des deux régimes de change dominants ces dernières décennies/change fixe et change flottant /. L’objet de cette note est de rappeler, tout d'abord, les fondamentaux économiques des deux systèmes et leur environnement historique (I). Ensuite, à la lumière de ces fondamentaux, pré ...

Income inequality is high in Morocco. In 2013, the share of national income1  of the richest 10% in Morocco stood at nearly 32%, 12 times higher than the share of national income of the poorest 10% of the population. This paper argues that, drawing on international experience, there is much more that Morocco’s government can do to reduce inequality while at the same time enhancing growth and – possibly – doing so in a manner that is budget-neutral or even budget-positive. Top of the ...

Since the Fed’s July meeting, when the Fed Funds Rate had a 0.25% cut, fears about the impact of the US-China trade war on the global economy have escalated. The US yield curve inversion received much attention as a harbinger of a slowdown in the global and US economic outlooks. We approach here whether lights on next monetary policy events can be obtained from reading the minutes of the Fed’s meeting – and of the July meeting of the ECB governing council – released this week. The ...

La création d’instruments financiers à la Conférence de Bretton Woods, à la fin de la Seconde  Guerre mondiale, était une nouveauté pour l’époque et avait sonné la fin du chacun pour soi « monétaire », en jetant les bases d’un système de changes fixes mais ajustables reconnaissant, cependant, et dès le départ, la primauté du dollar de la nouvelle grande puissance. Le Fonds monétaire international (FMI) devant se charger de venir en aide aux pays à la balance des paiements déficitai ...

Income inequality is high in Morocco. In 2013, the share of national income of the richest 10% in Morocco stood at nearly 32%, 12 times higher than the share of national income of the poorest 10% of the population. High inequality can adversely affect long-term growth as it tends to be associated with underutilization of human potential. This paper argues that, drawing on international experience, there is much more that Morocco’s government can do to reduce inequality while at the ...

This note approaches the relationship between natural wealth and economic growth, using the case of Sub-Sahara African economies as an illustration. Delving into recent World Bank reports, it highlights how a sustained positive correlation between natural capital and GDP growth happens through the transformation of the former into other forms of assets: produced capital, human capital and other intangible assets. Governance features and the quality of macroeconomic policies are of t ...