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We develop a macroeconomic model with physical and human capital, human capital risk, and limited contract enforcement. We show analytically that young (high-return) households are the most exposed to human capital risk and are also the least insured. We document this risk-insurance pattern in data on life-insurance drawn from the Survey of Consumer Finance. A calibrated version of the model can quantitatively account for the life-cycle variation of insurance observed in the US data and implies welfare costs of under-insurance for young households that are equivalent to a 4 percent reduction in lifetime consumption. A policy reform that makes consumer bankruptcy more costly leads to a substantial increase in the volume of credit and insurance.

Incomplete Markets --- Consumption • Saving • Wealth --- Employment • Unemployment • Wages • Intergenerational Income Distribution • Aggregate Human Capital • Aggregate Labor Productivity --- Human Capital • Skills • Occupational Choice • Labor Productivity

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This paper assesses a decade of experience in civil service reform in a sample of 32 sub-Saharan African countries. Many countries have made an important start towards reducing excessive staffing levels and the nominal wage bill, but less progress has been made in decompressing salary differentials in favor of higher-grade staff. In the CFA franc zone countries, real wages fell sharply after the 1994 devaluation, but the wage bill relative to tax revenue is still high in many countries. There is a need to consolidate quantitative first-generation reforms that contribute to macroeconomic stabilization. Equally important is the need to make progress on qualitative second-generation reforms, especially remuneration and promotion policies that reward performance and measures to improve civil service management. Such policies will require strong political commitment by governments.

Labor --- Employment --- Unemployment --- Wages --- Intergenerational Income Distribution --- Aggregate Human Capital --- Aggregate Labor Productivity --- Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs: General --- Civil service & public sector --- Labour --- income economics --- Civil service --- Civil service reform --- Real wages --- Economic theory --- Uganda --- Income economics

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This paper examines issues raised by the evolution of a rapidly growing small open economy—Singapore—from a labor-intensive, low-technology production base to a capital-intensive, high-technology, knowledge-and-skill-intensive emphasis as it approached the limits of its resource constraints in the labor market. In order to analyze the process of restructuring a model of endogenous growth for a small open economy that is driven by increases in labor productivity from learning and that allows for the dynamic acquisition of comparative advantage is developed. In this framework the effects of various policies and exogenous shocks on the direction and pace of restructuring are investigated.

Aggregate Human Capital --- Aggregate Labor Productivity --- Economic theory --- Employment --- Income economics --- Intergenerational Income Distribution --- Labor costs --- Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure --- Labor force --- Labor market --- Labor --- Labour --- Unemployment --- Wage adjustments --- Wages --- Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs: General --- Singapore

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This paper reports about the Per Jacobsson Foundation and various lectures in detail. Mr. Camdessus was educated at the University of Paris and earned postgraduate degrees in economics at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris and at the Ecole Nationale d'Administration Publique. He is a member of the Commission for Africa, which is chaired by the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair. Following his appointment as Administrateur Civil in the French Civil Service, Mr. Camdessus joined the Treasury in the Ministry of Finance in I960. After serving as Financial Attache to the French delegation at the European Economic Community in Brussels from 1966 to 1968, he returned to the Treasury and went on to become Assistant Director in 1971, Deputy Director in 1974, and Director in February 1982. Mr. Camdessus was appointed as Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Board of the IMF on January 16, 1987. On May 22, 1996, the Executive Board of the IMF unanimously selected him to serve a third five-year term as Managing Director, beginning January 16, 1997.

Aggregate Human Capital --- Aggregate Labor Productivity --- Banking --- Banks and Banking --- Banks and banking --- Banks --- Civil service & public sector --- Civil service --- Depository Institutions --- Employment --- Intergenerational Income Distribution --- Labor --- Micro Finance Institutions --- Mortgages --- Unemployment --- Wages --- France

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We show that a dynamic general equilibrium model with efficiency wages and endogenous capital accumulation in both the formal and (non-agricultural) informal sectors can explain the full range of confounding stylized facts associated with minimum wage laws in less developed countries.

Labor --- Macroeconomics --- Employment --- Unemployment --- Wages --- Intergenerational Income Distribution --- Aggregate Human Capital --- Aggregate Labor Productivity --- Labor Demand --- Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs: General --- Labor Economics: General --- Labour --- income economics --- Real wages --- Informal employment --- Economic theory --- Labor economics --- South Africa