This paper analyses the characteristics of firms that operate at the global productivity frontier and their relationship with other firms in the economy, focusing on the diffusion of global productivity gains and the policies that faciliate it.

This paper offers an overview of developments in household debt over the past decades across a large sample of OECD countries, highlighting both common trends and country specificities. It examines the vulnerabilities associated with high household debt for households, the financial system and the wider economy.

This paper provides analysis of the regulatory governance of network sector regulators in electricity, gas, telecommunications, rail, airport and ports within the OECD as it stood in 2013.

The Czech Republic needs new reforms to boost productivity, improve economic growth and accelerate convergence toward the levels of income and well-being seen in the most advanced European countries, according to a new OECD report.

The ECB, the Bank of Japan and five other central banks in Europe have applied negative interest rates on commercial banks’ reserves. This additional monetary policy stimulus, following large asset purchases by central banks in some of these areas, should boost the economy and thus raise inflation closer to target.

Concerns around weak productivity growth are everywhere these days. As the latest OECD Economic Outlook notes, since the mid-2000s, productivity growth has been markedly lower than at any other time since the 1950s.

This paper analyses the effects of product market reforms in the short and medium term across 10 regulated industries and 18 advanced economies for the period 1998-2013 using internationally comparable firm-level data based on Orbis.

This paper analyses the effects of product market reforms in the short and medium term across 10 regulated industries and 18 advanced economies for the period 1998-2013 using internationally comparable firm-level data based on Orbis.

Across the OECD, GDP per capita is converging. In contrast, regional disparities – or differences in GDP per capita across jurisdictions – are rising, mainly as a result of widening productivity differences. Fiscal decentralisation could help reduce them again. According to new OECD research, assigning more ownsource revenue to sub-national governments dampens regional GDP disparities and underpins regional convergence.

The post-crisis recovery in entrepreneurial activity remains mixed across countries, but new data released today by the OECD provides tentative signs of a turning point, with trends in enterprise creation rates pointing upwards in most economies.

Middle Eastern and North African countries should press ahead with further economic and structural reforms to boost flagging trade and investment, restore public trust and create jobs for the region’s young population, the OECD told ministers from the region today.

This paper seeks to provide up to date financial conditions indices for six countries, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States, as well as the euro area, updating earlier results by the OECD.

Productivity growth is essential for living standards to durably improve. Malaysia has reached a development stage where growth needs to be driven more by productivity gains than the sheer accumulation of capital and labour inputs.

This paper presents quantitative information on labour market flows for 25 OECD countries. It uses household surveys that offer the advantage of reporting monthly transitions between employment, unemployment and economic inactivity for individuals.

This document describes and discusses a new supply side framework that quantifies the impact of structural reforms on per capita income in OECD countries.

This document describes and discusses a new supply side framework that quantifies the impact of structural reforms on per capita income in OECD countries.

Stockbuilding pushes OECD GDP growth up to 0.5% in the third quarter of 2016

This paper explores the extent to which “zombie” firms – defined as old firms that have persistent problems meeting their interest payments – are stifling labour productivity performance.

This paper explores the extent to which “zombie” firms – defined as old firms that have persistent problems meeting their interest payments – are stifling labour productivity performance.

Labour markets are in a continual state of flux. Workers get employed, leave a job and become unemployed, join the labour force or leave the labour force. The balance of these flows determines the overall employment rate.

This paper investigates the relationship linking investment (capital stock) and structural policies.

Empirical research on the drivers of multi-factor productivity (MFP) is abundant at the firm- and industry level but surprisingly little research has been conducted on the determinants of MFP at the macroeconomic level.

Private consumption and investment main drivers of slowdown in OECD GDP growth in first quarter of 2017

This paper presents the global income distribution between all individuals living in the developed world.

Financial inclusion and women entrepreneurship concern policymakers because of their impact on job creation, economic growth and women empowerment.

Pick-up in private consumption and investment drives higher OECD GDP growth in second quarter of 2017

This paper analyses for 34 OECD countries the extent to which the calculation of aggregate multi-factor productivity (MFP) is sensitive to alternative parameterisations.

Lowering high levels of unemployment and inequality are amongst the largest challenges facing South Africa.

Redistribution is quantified as the relative reduction in market income inequality achieved by personal income taxes, employees’ social security contributions and cash transfers, based on household-level micro data.

Slower private consumption and investment weigh down on OECD GDP growth in third quarter of 2017

Many OECD countries have been facing a prolonged period of low growth and stagnating income of the poorest. This challenges governments’ fiscal redistribution, all the more so in a context where new forms of work are calling into question the effectiveness of traditional social safety nets and population ageing is putting pressure on public finances.

What is the relevant perspective for evaluating people’s living standards in advanced countries? According to standard assessments of inequality it is fellow citizens within the country.

From a feudal trading hub connecting South with East Asia in the 18th and 19th centuries, Thailand has developed into a rapidly modernising and more urban economy. The second half of the 20th century saw the rapid expansion in manufacturing and services, which underpinned its transformation into an upper-middle-income country.

This paper summarises earlier OECD work aimed at quantifying the impact of structural reforms on economic outcomes.

This paper presents country-specific effects of structural reforms. It discusses how sizeable and interesting country-specific effects can be identified in a panel setting by conditioning the impact of individual policies on their own level or on the stance of other policies and institutions.

Income inequality has increased in most OECD countries over the past two decades. This has come about both because incomes before taxes and transfers have become more unequally distributed, and because the extent of redistribution through taxes and transfers has fallen.

This paper investigates the effect of structural characteristics on debt limits of middle income countries.

Governments today need to balance the policy goals of boosting economic growth and improving equity when making budget decisions. How can public spending choices promote inclusive growth? What can be learned from previous spending decisions in times of crisis?

This paper explores cross-country differences in the design of insolvency regimes, based on quantitative indicators constructed from countries’ responses to a recent OECD policy questionnaire.

Health care expenditure per person, after accounting for changes in overall price levels, began to slow in many OECD countries in the early-to-mid 2000s, well before the economic and fiscal crisis.

Making SMEs and start-ups a driver of growth and job creation requires a number of policies to improve the performance of SMEs, whose labour productivity in the manufacturing sector has fallen to less than a third of that in large companies.

This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the "resource curse" phenomenon, i.e. the negative impact of oil abundance on long-term economic growth, for a set of oil exporting countries.

Using cross-country time series panel regressions for the last two decades, this paper seeks to identify the main policy and institutional factors that explain the share of selfemployment across European countries.

This note is taken from Chapter 2 of Economic Policy Reforms: Going for Growth 2012.

Brazil boasts one of the largest increases in expenditure on education between 2000 and 2009 among the countries for which data was available.

Tax revenues in Latin American countries are lower as a proportion of their national incomes than in most OECD countries, but are rising slowly. Revenue Statistics in Latin America shows that the average tax revenue to GDP ratio in the 15 Latin American countries covered by the report increased from 19% in 2009 to 19.4% in 2010, after falling from a high point of 19.7% in 2008.

These country notes profile public sector human resource practices and policies, covering issues including legal frameworks; age and gender composition of workers; public sector restructuring; management practices; industrial relations and reforms.

Gains in female education attainment have contributed to a worldwide increase in women’s participation in the labour force, but considerable gaps remain in working hours, conditions of employment and earnings.  More specific data for Brazil are available in this country note.

Education at a Glance 2013 - Country notes and key fact tables

This publication assesses the impact of previous competition law and policy reviews in nine Latin American countries: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico, Panama and Peru. This report was discussed during the 2012 annual meeting of the OECD-IDB Latin American Competition Forum held in the Dominican Republic.