Robert Allen’s recent AER paper on “Absolute Poverty: When Necessity Displaces Desire” is a fascinating read, on many levels. The paper uses linear programming (LP) to compute (four variants of)…

World Bank Vice President, Hafez Ghanem addresses the key factors influencing the economies of the Middle East and North Africa region, and the steps needed to promote more sustainable growth and…

This is the second part of our interview with with Safaa El Tayeb El-Kogali, World Bank Practice Manager in the Education Global Practice, on the challenges faced by the region’s education systems…

On the heels of the first World Development Report focused entirely on education, and its critical importance for stable and inclusive societies, we launch our annual ‘Back to School’ series that…

We know that fiscal policy can be harnessed to reduce inequality in low- and middle-income countries, but until now, we knew less about its ability to reduce poverty. Our recent volume looks at…

History repeats, history rhymes and sometimes history regresses. Wandering through cities and fields in the Middle East and North Africa a thousand years ago, you would have been struck by the…

Global economic growth is accelerating. After registering the slowest pace since the 2007-2009 financial crisis in 2016, global growth is expected to rise to a 2.7 percent pace this year and 2.9…

Rubens Donizeti Valeriano - Panamericano de MTB XCO 2014 - Barbacena - MG - Brasil. Photo: Daniela Luna Evidence-based rule-making for private sector development and service deliveryANNOUNCEMENT…

Photo: SkyPics Studio/Shutterstock Data on the sharing economy (Uber, Airbnb and so on) are scarce, but a recent study estimates that the revenue growth of these platforms has been dramatic. In…

Our continued belief in the enormous resourcefulness, resilience and sheer drive of young Arab women has yet again been reconfirmed.