The meltdown in oil markets is turning back the economic clock for Saudi Arabia, putting it on track for the deepest contraction in two decades.
Already under lockdown to contain the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, the world’s largest crude exporter is bracing for a second impact from the oil rout and unprecedented production cuts negotiated by OPEC and its allies. Both will slash government revenue, and in turn derail a fragile economic recovery. Brent crude traded at under $19 a barrel on Tuesday -- a quarter of the level...
The purpose of this article is to suggest how Sri Lanka can undertake significant structural reforms in the aftermath of this global pandemic and place herself in a position of increased economic strength.
Apart from the money the government will have to spend towards the medical management of the virus, it will have to spend a significant sum of money on social welfare and also support the corporate sector in the coming months. Economists are unable to estimate the sum of money that will be required for this purpose...
Like many nations, India does not have enough kits to test most of its population for the new coronavirus. The country is instead relying on people power: thousands of health-care workers are fanning out across the country to trace and quarantine people who might have had contact with those with COVID-19. People are typically only tested if they develop symptoms.
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However, further lockdowns could have dire consequences. Strict social-distancing measures mean that people must stay at home, so many cannot work —...
Así lo afirma el economista venezolano Ricardo Hausmann, director del Laboratorio de Crecimiento del Centro de Desarrollo Internacional de la Universidad de Harvard y docente de dicha institución.
"Los países que supuestamente han tenido éxitos iniciales en la lucha contra el coronavirus, como Dinamarca, Japón y Corea del Sur, deben preocuparse por qué tan exitosos han sido el resto de los países en controlar la pandemia", le dice a...
Governments are fighting to keep the coronavirus pandemic at bay and their economies afloat
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Still, Ricardo Hausmann, a Venezuelan development economist at Harvard University, is not holding out great hope. “The situation in the advanced economies is likely to be much more benign than what developing countries are facing.”
Mr Hausmann says developing economies have been left in the lurch both in terms of their ability to fight the pandemic and to counter its economic impact. Even in the best of times...
A lockdown is not sustainable and can bankrupt economies, especially those without fiscal space, says renowned economist Ricardo Hausmann.
Fiscal space generally refers to the availability of budgetary room that enables a government to provide resources for a desired purpose without compromising its ability to finance its operations and other obligations such as debt servicing.
While we are all watching the news about the explosion of COVID-19 cases in the United States, Spain and Italy, we will soon face a bigger problem.
After talking with almost a dozen experts from some of the world’s leading universities, I’m much more worried about what might soon happen in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean than about the latest U.S. or European pandemic statistics.
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Harvard University professor Ricardo Hausmann, an expert in global development issues, told me that the United...
COVID-19 is ravaging advanced economies such as Italy, France, Spain, and the United States. Beyond the deaths and human suffering, markets are discounting a catastrophic recession accompanied by massive defaults, as expressed in the radical repricing of corporate credit risk by financial markets.
At a moment when advanced economies are debating whether to fund ambitious fiscal packages with zero-interest rate Treasury debt or central bank (“helicopter”) money, we in Latin America feel like the heroes in John Ford´s classic 1930s Western film Stagecoach: Surrounded by enemies, and with precious few fiscal bullets to spare.
Indeed, emerging economies have suffered the double shock of a flight-to-quality increase in financial costs and a commodity price decline that narrows the room for fiscal policy to respond...
Trump says it would destroy us. Sanders says it will save us. The majority of millennials would like it to replace capitalism. But what is “it”? We bring in the economists to sort things out and tell us what the U.S. can learn from the good (and bad) experiences of other (supposedly) socialist countries.
