IMF Programs: Who is Chosen and What Are the Effects? / Robert J. Barro, Jong-Wha Lee.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Barro, Robert J.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Lee, Jong-Wha.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w8951.

NBER working paper series no. w8951

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

IMF Programs

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2002.

Summary:

IMF lending practices respond to economic conditions but are also sensitive to political-economy variables. Specifically, the sizes and frequencies of loans are influenced by a country's presence at the Fund, as measured by the country's share of quotas and professional staff. IMF lending is also sensitive to a country's political and economic proximity to some major shareholding countries of the IMF -- the United States, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom. We measured political proximity by voting patterns in the United Nations and economic proximity by bilateral trading volumes. These results are of considerable interest for their own sake but also provide instrumental variables for estimating the effects of IMF lending on economic performance. Instrumental estimates indicate that the size of IMF lending is insignificantly related to economic growth in the contemporaneous five-year period but has a significantly negative effect in the subsequent five years.

Notes:

Print version record

May 2002.