Narrow Your Choices

Refine By Countries

Refine By Series

Refine By Language

Refine By Date

—

Refine By IMF Taxonomy

Refine By JEL Taxonomy

Refine by LOC Taxonomy

Refine By THEMA Taxonomy

  • Print
  • Save

Business and Economics > Production and Operations Management

You are looking at 1 - 10 of 19 items for :

  • Type: Journal Issue x
Clear All Modify Search
Cover IMF Working Papers
What Can Artificial Intelligence Do for Stagnant Productivity in Latin America and the Caribbean?
Bas B. Bakker
,
Sophia Chen
,
Dmitry Vasilyev
,
Olga Bespalova
,
Moya Chin
,
Daria Kolpakova
,
Archit Singhal
, and
Yuanchen Yang
Since 1980, income levels in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) have shown no convergence with those in the US, in stark contrast to emerging Asia and emerging Europe, which have seen rapid convergence. A key factor contributing to this divergence has been sluggish productivity growth in LAC. Low productivity growth has been broad-based across industries and firms in the formal sector, with limited diffusion of technology being an important contributing factor. Digital technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) hold significant potential to enhance productivity in the formal sector, foster its expansion, reduce informality, and facilitate LAC’s convergence with advanced economies. However, there is a risk that the region will fall behind advanced countries and frontier emerging markets in AI adoption. To capitalize on the benefits of AI, policies should aim to facilitate technological diffusion and job transition.
Keywords:
Artificial Intelligence (AI); Productivity Stagnation; Technological Innovation; Latin America; Caribbean; Economic Growth; Labor Productivity; Automation; Macroeconomic Impact; Digital Transformation; Cross-Country Analysis; Regional Development; Technology Adoption; Emerging Economies; Economic Policy.; difference AI; AI adoption; technology producer; AI's role; Artificial intelligence; Productivity; North America; Europe; Global; Asia and Pacific
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Peru: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
The Selected Issues paper focuses on productivity and growth in Peru. Firms have maintained smaller sizes to avoid the application of a profit-sharing legislation, which has resulted in lower productivity. After a decade of high economic growth averaging over 6 percent per year, potential growth has been falling since 2014. A much slower pace of investment and human has driven the decline capital accumulation, but most notably, a decline in total factor productivity growth. In line with the macroeconomic trends, firm-level productivity has worsened, and the decline has been broad-based across the economy. Special corporate tax regimes and labor legislations and regulations have created barriers to productivity growth. To raise productivity, policies will need to focus on reforming regulations that impose excessive costs to formalizing or growing a business. Down the line, introducing greater labor market flexibility would ensure that workers could transition to productive sectors of the economy and reduce labor informality.
Keywords:
El Niño shock; building RESILIENCE; B. Measuring productivity; B. artificial intelligence; total factor productivity growth; labor force complementarity; Climate change; Natural disasters; Productivity; Potential output; Artificial intelligence; Global; Caribbean
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Liberia: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
Selected Issues
Keywords:
G. climate change policy priority; growth potential; A. climate change; dollarization indicator; climate change institution; Climate change; Monetary base; Currencies; Exchange rates; De-dollarization; Global; West Africa; Sub-Saharan Africa
Cover IMF Working Papers
Labor Market Informality and the Business Cycle
Frederic Lambert
,
Mr. Andrea Pescatori
, and
Mr. Frederik G Toscani
Labor market informality is a pervasive feature of most developing economies. Motivated by the empirical regularity that the labor informality rate falls with GDP per capita, both at business cycle frequency and in a cross-section of countries, and that the Okun's coefficient falls with the level of labor informality, we build a small open-economy dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model with two sectors, formal and informal, which can replicate these key stylized facts. The model is calibrated to Colombia. The results show that labor market and tax reforms play an important role in changing the informality rate but also caution against over-optimism - with low GDP per capita, informality will always be relatively high as there is insufficient demand for formal goods. Quantitatively we find that higher productivity in the formal sector is key in explaining the difference between Colombia and countries with significantly lower informality. We use the model to study how labor informality and labor market frictions mediate the cyclical response of the economy to shocks, including commodity price shocks which are particularly relevant in Latin America. Informality is shown to play an important role as a shock absorber with the informal-formal margin limiting movements in the employed-unemployed margin.
Keywords:
labor market; informality; business cycle; WP; commodity price shock; frictions affect labor market dynamics; GDP growth; sector TFP; labor market informality; TFP parameter; business cycle model; TFP shock; labor market frictions affect labor market dynamics; Total factor productivity; Labor markets; Business cycles; Unemployment
Cover Brazil
Brazil
Boom, Bust, and the Road to Recovery
Mr. Antonio Spilimbergo
and
Mr. Krishna Srinivasan

Abstract

Brazil is at crossroads, emerging slowly from a historic recession that was preceded by a huge economic boom. Reasons for the historic bust following a boom are manifold. Policy mistakes were an important contributory factor, and included the pursuit of countercyclical policies, introduced to deal with the effects of the global financial crisis, beyond the point where they were helpful. More fundamentally, it reflects longstanding structural weaknesses plaguing the economy, that also help explain Brazil’s uninspiring growth performance over the past four decades.

Keywords:
BOOK; Brazil; government; trade liberalization; wage bill; commodity exporter; monetary policy; political system; Corruption; Income inequality; Productivity; Personal income; Global; South America; Central America; Caribbean; Middle East; inflation expectation; anti-corruption authority ANAC; reform priority; Inflation; North Africa
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Uruguay: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
This Selected Issues paper investigates the impact of exchange rate movements on private consumption in Uruguay. Uruguay is a highly dollarized economy, which makes the relationship between exchange rate movements and private consumption particularly complex. The paper shows that a large share of Uruguayan households is liquidity constrained, which allows the transitory real income shocks brought about by exchange rate pass-through to have a significant impact on consumption. Moreover, exchange rate pass-through is highly heterogenous, with relative prices of durables increasing (decreasing) following a depreciation (appreciation). This creates incentives for households to engage in intertemporal substitution where they buy durables when they are relatively cheaper. Data from Input–Output tables show that Uruguay produces a nontrivial amount of the tradable, durable goods it consumes, opening the door to contractionary depreciations. The results offer a potential explanation for the often noted ‘excess volatility of consumption’ in emerging markets for the case of Uruguay.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; dollarization; exchange rate; deposit dollarization; productivity; exchange rate movement; credit dollarization; government investment multiplier; VAR model; Exchange rates; Consumption; Income; Labor productivity; Private consumption; Global; Caribbean
Cover Policy Papers
Structural Reforms and Macroeconomic Performance - Country Cases
International Monetary Fund
As a companion piece to the Board paper on Structural Reforms and Macroeconomic Performance: Initial Considerations for the Fund, this paper presents a selection of case studies on the structural reform experiences of member countries. These papers update the Board on work since the Triennial Surveillance Review toward strengthening the Fund’s capacity to analyze and, where relevant, offer policy advice on macro-relevant structural issues. The paper builds on the already considerable analytical work underway across the Fund, setting out considerations to support a more strategic approach going forward.
Keywords:
PP; authority; reform; enterprise; country; structural reform; reform effort; capital market; financial system; labor market; reform experience; reform strategy; country CasesStructural reform; Structural reforms; Total factor productivity; Competition; Trade liberalization; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Output Gap Uncertainty and Real-Time Monetary Policy
Mr. Francesco Grigoli
,
Alexander Herman
,
Mr. Andrew J Swiston
, and
Gabriel Di Bella
Output gap estimates are subject to a wide range of uncertainty owing to data revisions and the difficulty in distinguishing between cycle and trend in real time. This is important given the central role in monetary policy of assessments of economic activity relative to capacity. We show that country desks tend to overestimate economic slack, especially during recessions, and that uncertainty in initial output gap estimates persists several years. Only a small share of output gap revisions is predictable ex ante based on characteristics like output dynamics, data quality, and policy frameworks. We also show that for a group of Latin American inflation targeters the prescriptions from typical monetary policy rules are subject to large changes due to output gap revisions. These revisions explain a sizable proportion of the deviation of inflation from target, suggesting this information is not accounted for in real-time policy decisions.
Keywords:
WP; output gap revision; output gap estimate; Output gap; monetary policy; policy rule; data revisions; real-time; uncertainty; Brazil; Chile; Colombia; Mexico; Peru; inflation target; business cycle; A. output gap definition; output gap uncertainty; output gap term; Abs. output gap; output gap data; Potential output; Inflation; Inflation targeting; Fiscal rules; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Measuring External Risks for Peru: Insights from a Macroeconomic Model for a Small Open and Partially Dollarized Economy
Mr. Fei Han
This paper quantifies the effects of external risks for Peru, with particular attention to two major external risks, China’s investment slowdown and the U.S. monetary policy tightening. In particular, a macroeconomic model for a small open and partially dollarized economy is developed and estimated for Peru to measure the risk spillovers, and simulate domestic macroeconomic responses in different scenarios with these two external risks. The simulation results suggest that Peru’s output is vulnerable to both risks, particularly the U.S. monetary policy tightening. Simulations also highlight the importance of higher exchange rate flexiblity and a lower degree of dollarization, which could help mitigate the negative spillover effects of these external risks.
Keywords:
WP; interest rate; exchange rate; monetary policy; Macroeconomic Model; Partial Dollarization; External Risk; Spillovers; Macroeconomic Forecast; China scenario; investment slowdown; copper export; U.S. dollar; Peru's output gap; mineral imports; federal funds rate; terms-of-trade gap; macroeconomic response; World metal price inflation; Output gap; Exchange rates; Exchange rate flexibility; Inflation; Metal prices; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Peru: Selected Issues Paper
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
This Selected Issues paper assesses empirically the motives and effectiveness of foreign exchange (FX) interventions in Peru. The results of the study indicate asymmetries both in the Central Reserve Bank of Peru’s reaction function and in the effectiveness of FX interventions. Probit estimates of the likelihood of FX purchases and sales, in the first stage of the regression, show that both forms of intervention are targeted at leaning against the wind; that is, resisting appreciation in the former case and resisting depreciation in the latter. But only FX sales, not FX purchases, react to volatility. Similarly, instrumental variable regression results show evidence of asymmetry in the effectiveness of FX interventions.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; Peru; revenue; investment slowdown; FX intervention; U.S. dollar; real GDP; economic activity; net resource wealth; resource revenue; investment theory; investment growth; FX purchase; Exchange rates; Fiscal governance; Natural resources; Capital flows; Global