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The authors use panel data on the number of new firm registrations in 95 countries to study the impact of the business environment and 2008 financial crisis on new firm registration. The data show that more dynamic formal business creation occurs in countries that provide entrepreneurs with a stable legal and regulatory regime, fast and inexpensive business registration process, more flexible employment regulations, and low corporate taxes. The data also show that nearly all countries experienced a sharp drop in business entry during the crisis. This drop is more pronounced in countries with higher levels of financial development and countries more affected by the crisis.

Accountability --- Business environment --- Corruption --- Country data --- E-Business --- Economic development --- Economic growth --- Economic Theory & Research --- Emerging Markets --- Environment --- Environmental Economics & Policies --- Financial development --- Financial information --- Governance --- Governance Indicators --- Government effectiveness --- Income --- Institutional quality --- Legal systems --- Local business --- Low income countries --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Market economy --- Political stability --- Private Sector Development --- Regulatory quality --- Regulatory regime --- Rule of law

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This paper reports on the 2009 update of the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) research project, covering 212 countries and territories and measuring six dimensions of governance between 1996 and 2008: Voice and Accountability, Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism, Government Effectiveness, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law, and Control of Corruption. These aggregate indicators are based on hundreds of specific and disaggregated individual variables measuring various dimensions of governance, taken from 35 data sources provided by 33 different organizations. The data reflect the views on governance of public sector, private sector and NGO experts, as well as thousands of citizen and firm survey respondents worldwide. The authors also explicitly report the margins of error accompanying each country estimate. These reflect the inherent difficulties in measuring governance using any kind of data. They find that even after taking margins of error into account, the WGI permit meaningful cross-country comparisons as well as monitoring progress over time. The aggregate indicators, together with the disaggregated underlying indicators, are available at www.govindicators.org.

Accountability --- Aggregate governance indicators --- Aggregate indicators --- Citizen --- Corruption --- Corruption perceptions --- Country estimate --- Economic Policy, Institutions and Governance --- Governance --- Governance Indicators --- Government effectiveness --- Institutional quality --- Investment climate --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Measurement error --- Measuring governance --- National Governance --- Perceptions index --- Political stability --- Public Sector Corruption and Anticorruption Measures --- Public Sector Development --- Regulatory quality --- Rule of law --- Transparency --- Unobserved components model --- Worldwide governance indicators

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This paper summarizes the methodology of the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) project, and related analytical issues. The WGI cover over 200 countries and territories, measuring six dimensions of governance starting in 1996: Voice and Accountability, Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism, Government Effectiveness, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law, and Control of Corruption. The aggregate indicators are based on several hundred individual underlying variables, taken from a wide variety of existing data sources. The data reflect the views on governance of survey respondents and public, private, and NGO sector experts worldwide. The WGI also explicitly report margins of error accompanying each country estimate. These reflect the inherent difficulties in measuring governance using any kind of data. Even after taking these margins of error into account, the WGI permit meaningful cross-country and over-time comparisons. The aggregate indicators, together with the disaggregated underlying source data, are available at www.govindicators.org.

Accountability --- Aggregate indicator --- Aggregate indicators --- Composite indicators --- Corruption --- Corruption perceptions --- Country estimate --- Economic Policy --- Good governance --- Governance --- Governance Indicators --- Government effectiveness --- Institutional quality --- Institutions and Governance --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Measuring governance --- National Governance --- Non governmental organizations --- Political stability --- Public Sector Corruption & Anticorruption Measures --- Public Sector Development --- Public sector management --- Regulatory quality --- Rule of law --- Science and Technology Development --- Statistical & Mathematical Sciences --- Statistical methodology --- Transparency --- Unobserved components model --- Worldwide governance indicators

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July 2000 - Do higher levels of aid erode the very quality of governance poor countries need for sustained and rapid income growth? Good governance-in the form of institutions that establish predictable, impartial, and consistently enforced rules for investors-is crucial for the sustained and rapid growth of per capita incomes in poor countries. Aid dependence can undermine institutional quality by weakening accountability, encouraging rent seeking and corruption, fomenting conflict over control of aid funds, siphoning off scarce talent from the bureaucracy, and alleviating pressures to reform inefficient policies and institutions. Knack's analyses of cross-country data provide evidence that higher aid levels erode the quality of governance, as measured by indexes of bureaucratic quality, corruption, and the rule of law. This negative relationship strengthens when instruments for aid are used to correct for potential reverse causality. It is robust to changes in the sample and to several alternative forms of estimation. Recent studies have concluded that aid's impact on economic growth and infant mortality is conditional on policy and institutional gaps. Knack's results indicate that the size of the institutional gap itself increases with aid levels. This paper-a product of Regulation and Competition Policy, Development Research Group-is part of a larger effort in the group to identify the determinants of good governance and institutions conducive to long-run economic development. The author may be contacted at sknack@worldbank.org.

Accountability --- Aid Dependence --- Bureaucracy --- Bureaucratic Quality --- Corruption --- Country Data --- Development Economics and Aid Effectiveness --- Disability --- Economic Growth --- Economic Theory and Research --- Education --- Emerging Markets --- Foreign Aid --- Gender --- Gender and Health --- Good Governance --- Governance --- Governance Indicators --- Growth --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Income --- Income Growth --- Institutional Quality --- Institutions --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- National Governance --- Natural Resources --- Per Capita Incomes --- Policy Implications --- Private Sector Development --- Public Sector Corruption and Anticorruption Measures --- Reverse Causality --- Rule Of Law --- School Health --- Social Protections and Labor

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This book focuses on empirical analyses of the Environmental Kuznets Curve. Most papers apply their research on CO2 emissions. The papers in this Special Issue seek to improve modeling techniques to prevent econometrical flaws (e.g., by adding additional explanatory variables and/or moving away from linear regression models) and apply their models to specific countries or groups of countries.

Technology: general issues --- History of engineering & technology --- productivity changes --- technical efficiency --- energy industry --- DEA-based Malmquist productivity index --- European Union --- Environmental Kuznets Curve --- carbon dioxide emissions --- environmental degradation --- financial development --- energy use --- institutional quality --- institutional development --- human capital --- CO2 emissions --- co-integration analysis --- pollution-income --- Environmental Kunzets Curve --- education --- income-inequality --- Europe --- panel data --- clustering --- carbon tax --- price elasticity --- translog cost function --- energy and carbon performance --- environmental kuznets curve --- kink regression model --- G7 countries --- EKC estimation --- CO2 emissions prediction --- neural networks --- radial basis function neural network --- renewable energy consumption --- n/a