Simpler approaches to a global tax plan
More than 130 countries have lined up in favour of a global redesign of corporate taxes. The redesign calls for multinational giants to pay their...
Opinion Pieces
Changing bankruptcy law has given firms time to adapt and recover
Bankruptcies are costly, but economists worry about keeping doomed firms alive. Simeon Djankov (LSE) argues that restructuring bankruptcy laws has...
Gendered laws curb Olympic success
Legal gender equality is key for female participation in the labour market. The association between women’s legal empowerment and success in sports is...
Reducing the compliance costs of regulation
In much of the world, property sales are highly regulated and expensive. Using World Bank data, this column shows that while regulators and...
Measuring human capital: Learning matters more than schooling
Human capital is a critical component of economic development. But the links between growth and human capital – when measured by years of schooling –...
US business dynamism rises
Steep falls in entrepreneurial activity were recorded in early 2020 across G7 economies. In the US, however, the creation of US startups shot up by 24...
As COVID rages, bankruptcy cases fall
Bankruptcies have fallen sharply in OECD economies because of the array of COVID-related support available to businesses, as well as imposed moratoria...
Vaccine challenges
Last week brought welcome news about the apparent effectiveness of a potential Covid-19 vaccine. While the challenges of manufacturing and...
Financial policymaking after crises: Public versus private interest
Financial crises invariably lead governments to intervene in one way or another, whether to ease the damage to middle-class voters, to respond to the...
Making furlough portable would encourage people to move into new jobs
Furlough is here to stay – in the UK, at least until March. The author argues that making part of furlough income portable would encourage people to...
Reform bankruptcy laws to save businesses from going under
Faced with the prospect of hundreds of thousands of businesses going under, the UK changed its bankruptcy laws in June. Other G7 countries that put...
COVID-19 hurt women’s employment the hardest
Changes to maternity leave and pension regulation, among other policy tools, can lessen the burden on women.
Reviving tourism in the COVID era: bungs, tax cuts and no more tour buses
Tourism has taken an enormous hit during the pandemic. Simeon Djankov (LSE) looks at some of the ways governments are trying to revive the sector –...
Moving property sales online could give developing economies a boost
In some countries, COVID-19 has prompted property transactions to move online, and in these places the market has picked up as a result. It represents...
Measuring property rights institutions
In a world of limited public capacity, which rules and institutions that protect property rights have the largest impact on economic activity? This...
Five things the French and German recovery plans have in common (and what’s missing)
France and Germany have announced big recovery plans. Simeon Djankov looks at what they have in common – and what’s missing from both.
