Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Growth in the Dominican Republic and Haiti: Why has the Grass Been Greener on One Side of Hispaniola

Contents:

Author Info

  • Laura Jaramillo
  • Cemile Sancak
Registered author(s):

    Abstract

    The Dominican Republic and Haiti share the island of Hispaniola and are broadly similar in terms of geography and historical institutions, yet their growth performance has diverged remarkably. The countries had the same per capita real GDP in 1960 but, by 2005, the Dominican Republic's per capita real GDP had tripled whereas that of Haiti had halved. Drawing on the growth literature, the paper explains this divergence through a combined approach that includes a panel regression to study growth determinants across a broad group of countries, and a case study framework to better understand the specific policy decisions and external conditions that have shaped economic outcomes in the Dominican Republic and Haiti. The paper finds that initial conditions cannot fully explain the growth divergence, but rather policy decisions have played a central role in the growth trends of the two countries. This Working Paper should not be reported as representing the views of the IMF. The views expressed in this Working Paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF or IMF policy. Working Papers describe research in progress by the author(s) and are published to elicit comments and to further debate.

    Download Info

    If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
    File URL: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=20520
    Download Restriction: no

    Bibliographic Info

    Paper provided by International Monetary Fund in its series IMF Working Papers with number 07/63.

    as in new window
    Length: 31
    Date of creation: 01 Mar 2007
    Date of revision:
    Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:07/63

    Contact details of provider:
    Postal: International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC USA
    Phone: (202) 623-7000
    Fax: (202) 623-4661
    Email:
    Web page: http://www.imf.org/external/pubind.htm
    More information through EDIRC

    Order Information:
    Web: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/pubs/ord_info.htm

    Related research

    Keywords: Economic growth; Economic models;

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    References

    References listed on IDEAS
    Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
    as in new window
    1. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James A. Robinson, 2001. "The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1369-1401, December.
    2. King, Robert G. & Levine, Ross, 1993. "Finance and growth : Schumpeter might be right," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1083, The World Bank.
    3. Paul Romer, 1991. "Endogenous Technological Change," NBER Working Papers 3210, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Treisman, Daniel, 2000. "The causes of corruption: a cross-national study," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 399-457, June.
    5. Miller, Stephen M. & Upadhyay, Mukti P., 2000. "The effects of openness, trade orientation, and human capital on total factor productivity," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 399-423, December.
    6. King, Robert G. & Levine, Ross, 1993. "Finance, entrepreneurship and growth: Theory and evidence," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 513-542, December.
    7. Graciela L. Kaminsky & Carmen M. Reinhart, 1996. "The twin crises: the causes of banking and balance-of-payments problems," International Finance Discussion Papers 544, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    8. Vatcharin Sirimaneetham, 2006. "Explaining policy volatility in developing countries," Bristol Economics Discussion Papers 06/583, Department of Economics, University of Bristol, UK.
    9. Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew Warner, 1995. "Economic Reform and the Process of Global Integration," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(1, 25th A), pages 1-118.
    10. Dollar, David & Kraay, Aart, 2001. "Trade, growth, and poverty," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2615, The World Bank.
    11. King, Robert G. & Levine, Ross, 1993. "Finance and growth : Schumpeter might be right," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1083, The World Bank.
    12. Easterly, william, 2001. "Growth implosions, debt explosions, and my Aunt Marilyn : do growth slowdowns cause public debt crises?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2531, The World Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as in new window

    Cited by:
    1. Ewout Frankema & Aline Masé, 2012. "An Island Drifting Apart: Why Haiti mires in poverty while the Dominican Republic forges ahead," Working Papers 0027, Utrecht University, Centre for Global Economic History.

    Lists

    This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:07/63

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Jim Beardow) or (Hassan Zaidi).

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

    If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.