The Future of Finance & Trade in Africa Conference

Wednesday, April 17th
8:00 am – 7:30 pm ET
1957 E St NW, Washington DC
Elliott School of International Affairs

The Institute for International Economic Policy was pleased to announce that the Conference on The Future of Finance and Trade in Africa will take place on Wednesday, April 17th, 2024 at the Elliott School of International Affairs. This conference was co-sponsored by the GW School of Business, The Growth Dialogue, and Believe in Africa.

Breakfast (8:00 – 9:00 am)

 

Welcome Remarks (9:00 – 9:15 am)
Ellen Granberg, President of George Washington University

Keynote Address (9:15 – 10:00 am)
The Honorable Wes Moore, Governor of Maryland

Meetings with Business Leaders by the Honorable Wes Moore (9:30 am, separate breakout room)

 

SESSION 1: Emerging Technologies for Inclusive Financial Services Delivery (9:30 – 10:40 am)

SESSION 2: Climate Finance and Financial Innovation (10:45-11:45 am)

 

LUNCH SESSION: Governors of Central Banks and the Future of African Finance (11:50 am – 1:20 pm)
Led by Danny Leipziger, Managing Director of The Growth Dialogue; Professor of Practice of International Business

SESSION 3: Financial Innovations Driving Africa’s Growth (1:30 – 2:40 pm)

Coffee Break (2:40 – 3:00 pm)

SESSION 4: U.S. Economic Policy in Africa: Supporting Progress on the Continent (3:00 – 4:00 pm)

Sponsors (4:00 – 4:30 pm)

Africa Open for Business (4:30 – 5:00 pm)

Closing Keynote Presentation (5:15 pm)
Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, U.S Representative for Florida’s 20th District

Reception (5:30 – 7:30 pm)

About the Keynote Speakers

Wes Moore is the 63rd Governor of the state of Maryland. He is Maryland’s first Black Governor in the state’s 246-year history, and is just the third African American elected Governor in the history of the United States. Moore is a proud graduate of Valley Forge Military Academy and College, where he received an Associate’s degree in 1998, and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army. Afterward, he went on to earn his Bachelor’s in international relations and economics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa. While at Johns Hopkins, Moore interned in the office of former Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke. Moore was the first Black Rhodes Scholar in the history of Johns Hopkins University. As A Rhodes Scholar, he earned a Master’s in international relations from Wolfson College at Oxford. In 2005, Moore deployed to Afghanistan as a captain with the 82nd Airborne Division, leading soldiers in combat. Immediately upon returning home, Moore served as a White House Fellow, advising on issues of national security and international relations.

 


Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormickCongresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick
, the first Black woman to represent Florida’s 20th congressional district, was re-elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in January 2023 to serve a second term. Congresswoman Cherfilus-McCormick is honored to serve on the House Committee on Foreign Affairs and the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs as the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Technology Modernization. She is also the Chair of the Diversity & Inclusion Task Force for the Democratic Women’s Caucus, a Co-Chair of the Haiti Caucus, and serves as a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. Congresswoman Cherfilus-McCormick earned her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Government from Howard University. In further pursuit of education, the Congresswoman also earned a Juris Doctorate from St. Thomas University. While in office, she remains committed to tackling the growing housing crisis, inadequate access to quality health care, and lack of equitable opportunities throughout her district and country.

The Economic Prospects of Middle-Income Countries

Monday, December 4th, 2023
5:30 – 7:30 pm ET
City View Room, Elliott School of International Affairs
1957 E Street, NW, 7th Floor

We are disappointed to inform you that, due to unforeseen circumstances, the upcoming event with Dr. Yunus has been postponed. The Wenger Lecture will continue as planned, and all those previously registered are invited to attend.

We are pleased to announce that Indermit Gill, Chief Economist of the World Bank Group and Senior Vice President for Development Economics, will be joining us along with Christopher Fussner, BA ’79, as part of the Wenger Family Lecture series on International Business and Finance on December 4th, 2023. This lecture will discuss “The Economic Prospects of Middle-Income Countries.” Professor James Foster will serve as the moderator.

The event will begin with a discussion from 5:30 – 6:30 pm, followed by a reception from 6:30-7:30 pm. The event will be hybrid.

About the Speaker:

Indermit Gill is Chief Economist of the World Bank Group and Senior Vice President for Development Economics.
Before starting this position on September 1, 2022, Gill served as the World Bank’s Vice President for Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions, where he helped shape the Bank’s response to the extraordinary series of shocks that have hit developing economies since 2020. Between 2016 and 2021, he was a professor of public policy at Duke University and non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Global Economy and Development program.

Gill led the World Bank’s influential 2009 World Development Report on economic geography. His work includes introducing the concept of the “middle-income trap” to describe how countries stagnate after reaching a certain level of income. He has published extensively on key policy issues facing developing countries—among other things, sovereign debt vulnerabilities, green growth and natural-resource wealth, labor markets, and poverty and inequality.

Gill has also taught at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago.

 

Photo of Christopher FussnerChristopher Fussner founded and owns TransTechnology Pte. Ltd. in Singapore in 1988, a major distributor of surface mount technology and semiconductor capital equipment. Headquartered in Singapore, Trans-Tec has 235 employees worldwide with offices in China, India, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Thailand, United States, and Vietnam. He has had extensive experience in negotiating and establishing joint ventures, strategic alliances, licenses, distribution networks and sales worldwide. In addition, Mr. Fussner is also founder and owner of Certain Cellars Pte. Ltd. in Singapore, an importer and distributor of fine wines. Prior to forming these companies, Mr. Fussner headed Asia sales for Amistar Corporation based in Seoul, Korea and Singapore. As such, he was responsible for sales and service for electronics manufacturing industry machines in Australia, Asia, and India.

Mr. Fussner began his international career during the late 1978 in Ouagadougou (Upper Volta) Burkino Faso, where he was involved in aid work for Catholic Relief Services. He subsequently joined Church World Services during 1979 – 1980, devoting his time as a refugee resettlement officer in Malaysia, being responsible for the resettlement process of Vietnamese refugees. Mr. Fussner also taught English at the Hyundai Corporation in Seoul, Korea. As a young man, Mr. Fussner also worked in New York as a steamfitter, waiter, busboy, paperboy, and gardener.

Mr. Fussner received his B.A. in History and East Asian Studies from George Washington University Elliott School of International Affairs (1979), and his M.I.M. (Master of International Management) at the Thunderbird School of Global Management in Phoenix, Arizona (1982). He is proficient in Chinese and French with some knowledge of Korean and Spanish.

About the Moderator:

Picture of James FosterProfessor James Foster is the Vice Dean of the Elliott School of International Affairs, Oliver T. Carr, Jr. Professor of International Affairs, and Professor of Economics at the George Washington University. He is also a Research Associate at the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative at Oxford University. Professor Foster’s research focuses on welfare economics — using economic tools to evaluate and enhance the wellbeing of people. His work underlies many well-known social indices including the global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) published annually by the UNDP in the Human Development Report, dozens of national MPIs used to guide domestic policy against poverty, the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) at USAID, the Gross National Happiness Index of Bhutan, the Better Jobs Index of the InterAmerican Development Bank, and the Statistical Performance Index of the World Bank. Prof. Foster received his PhD in Economics from Cornell University and has a Doctorate Honoris Causa from Universidad Autonoma del Estado Hidalgo (Mexico).

IMF Africa REO

Wednesday, November 16th, 2022

10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

via Zoom and In-Person

We are pleased to invite you to an event titled “Living on the Edge: A Discussion of the IMF’s Africa Regional Economic Outlook” on Wednesday, November 16th, 2022 from 10:00 am – 12:00 pm EST. This event will feature two panels. The first panel, “Building a More Food-Secure Sub-Saharan Africa” will feature IMF presenters Ivanova Reyes (IMF) and Qianqian Zhang (IMF) alongside discussant Moses Kansanga (GW). The second panel, “Managing Oil Price Uncertainty and the Energy Transition,” will feature IMF presenter Hany Abdel-Latif (IMF) alongside discussant Robert J. Weiner (GW). Catherine Pattillo, a Deputy Director in the IMF’s African Department, will provide welcome remarks alongside IIEP Director Steve Suranovic. This event is co-sponsored by the Institute for African Studies.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s (SSA) recovery has been abruptly interrupted. Last year, activity finally bounced back, lifting GDP growth in 2021 to 4.7 percent. But growth in 2022 is expected to slow sharply by more than 1 percentage point to 3.6 percent, as a worldwide slowdown, tighter global financial conditions, and a dramatic pickup in global inflation spill into a region already wearied by an ongoing series of shocks. Rising food and energy prices are impacting the region’s most vulnerable, and public debt and inflation are at levels not seen in decades. Against this backdrop, and with limited options, many countries find themselves pushed closer to the edge. The near-term outlook is extremely uncertain as the region’s prospects are tied to developments in the global economy and with a number of countries facing difficult sociopolitical and security situations at home. Within this challenging environment, policymakers must confront immediate socioeconomic crises as they arise, while also endeavoring to reduce vulnerabilities to future shocks, building resilience. Ultimately, however, the region’s safety and prosperity will require high-quality growth and the implementation of policies that will set the stage for a sustainable recovery, helping countries move away from the edge.

Agenda

10:00-10:10 – Welcome and conjuncture chapter – IIEP Director Steve Suranovic and IMF Africa Deputy Director Catherine Pattillo

10:10-10:55 – Panel 1 – Building a More Food-Secure Sub-Saharan Africa
Ivanova Reyes Peguero and Qianqian Zhang – IMF Presenters
Moses Kansanga, GW Discussant
Moderator and Audience Q&A

10:55-11:10 – Coffee Break

11:10-11:55 – Panel 2 – Managing Oil Price Uncertainty and the Energy Transition
Hany Abdel-Latif – IMF Presenter
Robert Weiner, GW Discussant
Moderator and Audience Q&A

11:55-12:00 – Wrap-up

Welcoming Remarks:

Catherina Pattillo is a Deputy Director in the IMF’s African Department where she oversees work on several countries, as well as on climate change, capacity development, gender and research. Since joining the Fund from a position at Oxford University, she has worked in the Fiscal Affairs Department where she was chief of the division responsible for the IMF’s Fiscal Monitor, the Research Department, and on countries in Africa and the Caribbean, and the Strategy, Policy and Review Department where she worked on low-income country issues, and emerging issues such as gender, inequality, and climate change. She has published in these areas, as well as on Sustainable Development Goals, firm dynamics in sub-Saharan Africa, growth, investment, debt, monetary and exchange rate policies, aid, and currency crises. She received her Ph.D in Economics from Yale University.

Steve Suranovic is the Director at the Institute for International Economic Policy and an Associate Professor of Economics and International Affairs at the George Washington University.  He is the current Director of the GW Global Bachelor’s program (Shanghai), and a former Director of the Elliot School’s Masters in International Economic Policy.  He teaches courses in international economics and microeconomics principles.  His research includes theoretical analysis of the role of ethics in economics, international trade policy, behavioral models of addiction, energy policy, and climate change policy.  (RePEcGoogle ScholarResearch GateSSRN)

Professor Suranovic received his B.S. in mathematics from the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign and his M.S. and Ph.D. in economics from Cornell University. He has published in numerous academic journals, including the Journal of International Economics, the Canadian Journal of Economics, World Economy, and the Journal of Health Economics. His book titled, “A Moderate Compromise: Policy Choice in an Era of Globalization,” published by Palgrave-Macmillan, offers a critique of current methods of policy evaluation and choice and suggests a simple, principled, and moderate alternative.  He also has several textbooks about International Economics published by Flat World Knowledge. Professor Suranovic maintains two educational websites. The International Economics Study Center features a free online international economics textbook, and a complete Survey of International Economics course that includes a textbook, PPT presentations, video lectures, and problem sets.  The Ethical Economics Study Center features a collection of primers highlighting the role of ethical behavior in fostering good (or efficient) economic outcomes.  It also features case studies, including selected movie reviews, demonstrating how unethical behavior is often responsible for the negative outcomes attributed to free markets.

Panelists:

Ivanova Reyes is an economist working in the Regional Studies Division of the International Monetary Fund’s African Department.  Prior to joining the IMF, she worked at Gettysburg College, the World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, Ministry of Economy of the Dominican Republic (DR), Superintendency of Pensions of the DR and Pontificia Universidad Catolica (PUCMM) of DR.  She holds a PhD in Economics from American University, a masters in economics from Georgetown University and a masters in applied macroeconomics from the Pontificia Universidad Catolica (PUC) of Chile.  Her research is focused on analyzing the impact of China’s economy on Latin America and the Caribbean.

 

Hany Abdel-Latif is an Economist in the Regional Studies Division in the IMF’s African Department. Previously, he worked as a lecturer (assistant professor) at Swansea University UK, where he taught econometrics, macroeconomics, and economic policy. His research covers commodity, financial liquidity, and geopolitical risk shocks, among other macro-financial issues. Hany is a research fellow of the Economic Research Forum (ERF) and a fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA) UK. He has acted as a consultant at several institutions, including the UNDP and Cambridge University Assessment. He holds a PhD from Swansea University and an MSc from City, University of London.

 

Qianqian Zhang is an economist in the African Department at the IMF. Her research interests include fiscal policy, fiscal decentralization, gender, and development issues. She previously worked in the Fiscal Affairs Department and as a country economist for Afghanistan. She received her PhD from George Washington University and her master’s degree from Cornell University.

 

 

Discussants:

Moses Kansanga is an Assistant Professor of Geography and International Affairs at The George Washington University. He is a critical geographer whose research explores questions at the intersection of sustainable food systems and natural resource management from a political ecology perspective. For the past decade, Moses has worked with smallholder farming communities in the Global South with concentration on sustainable agriculture and natural resource politics. He received his PHD at University of Western Ontario.

 

Robert Weiner is the director of the Master of Science in International Business program and a professor of international business, public policy & public administration, and international affairs at the George Washington University School of Business, Washington D.C. He serves concurrently as deputy director of the Master of Science in Government Contracts, a joint program of the GW Schools of Business and Law. He is a faculty director of the Business School’s Center for International Business Education and Research, and an affiliate of the Elliott School of International Affairs’ Institute for International Economic Policy, Institute for Middle East Studies, Institute for Security and Conflict Studies, and Sigur Center for Asian Studies. He is also senior advisor to the Brattle Group. He received his PhD from Harvard University.

How is the Roll Out of Digital RMB Changing the Financial System in China and Abroad?

Friday, November 19th, 2021
9:30 – 11:00 a.m. ET
via Zoom

The Institute for International Economic Policy was pleased to invite you to the third event in the 14th annual Conference on China’s Economic Development and U.S.-China Economic Relations. This year, the conference took place as a virtual series. The conference was co-sponsored by the Sigur Center for Asian Studies and the GW Center for International Business Education and Research (GW-CIBER).

This event featured Fudan University’s Jun Qian discussing “How is the Roll Out of Digital RMB Changing the Financial System in China and Abroad?” Martin Chorzempa of the Peterson Institute for International Economics provided discussant remarks. IIEP’s Maggie Chen provided welcoming remarks.

The rapid development of mobile electronic devices and softwares is leading our life towards a “cashless society,” and is redefining cross-border payment systems by making small value and high frequency transactions much more accessible than before. Digital currencies began with only non-sovereign cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and stable coins USDT, issued by anonymous and private institutions, but has evolved to a “dual-tier system” after Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) emerged. Currently, all major central banks around the globe are either in the process of launching, or proactively researching on their own CBDC. China is leading the way with its  CBDC roll-out (digital RMB, or e-CNY), issued by the People’s Bank of China (PBC)). The digital RMB has been issued and used in an increasing number of large cities and multiple consumption scenes.

About the Speaker

Picture of Jun QianProfessor Jun Qian is currently a Professor of Finance and Executive Dean at Fanhai International School of Finance (FISF), Fudan University.

Prior to joining FISF, he was Professor of Finance at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and Director of the DBA/EMBA/EE programs; he was also the Deputy Director of China Academy of Financial Research. Before returning to China in 2013, he was a tenured finance professor at the Carroll School of Management, Boston College.

Professor Qian’s research interests span many topics of corporate finance, financial institutions and capital markets. His research papers have been published in top academic journals including the American Economic Review, Journal of Finance, Review of Financial Studies and Journal of International Economics. One of his best known papers, published in the Journal of Financial Economics in 2005, is elected an “All-Star” paper based on its large number of citations. He also contributed book chapters on developing financial systems, including China’s Great Economic Transformation, Emerging Giants: China and India in the World Economy, China’s Emerging Financial Markets: Challenges and Opportunities, and Global Perspectives of Rule of Law.

Professor Qian is an Associate Editor of Frontiers of Economics in China and was on the editorial board of Review of Finance. He is a Research Fellow at the Financial Institutions Center of the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. He has also been on the organizing committee of the China International Conference in Finance, the best academic finance conference in Asia, since its inception, and served as conference Co-Chair during 2008-2010. In addition, he was one of the academic advisors for The Chinese Finance Association, the largest organization for Chinese finance practitioners in the U.S. He also served as a visiting or special-term professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, the Wharton School, School of Economics and Management of Tsinghua University, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, and Shanghai National Accounting Institute.

Professor Qian received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 2000, and his B.S. degree in economics from University of Iowa. He also enrolled at Department of International Economics, Fudan University as an undergraduate.

About the Discussant

Picture of Martin ChorzempaMartin Chorzempa, senior fellow since January 2021, joined the Peterson Institute for International Economics as a research fellow in 2017. He gained expertise in financial innovation while in Germany as a Fulbright Scholar and researcher at the Association of German Banks. He conducted research on financial liberalization in Beijing, first as a Luce Scholar at Peking University’s China Center for Economic Research and then at the China Finance 40 Forum, China’s leading independent think tank. In 2017, he graduated from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government with a masters in public administration in international development. He is working on a forthcoming book on fintech in China. He has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Financial Times, MIT Technology Review, and Foreign Affairs.

Welcoming Remarks

Picture of Maggie ChenMaggie Chen is Professor of Economics and International Affairs at George Washington University. She has served as Director of GW’s Institute for International Economic Policy and worked as an economist in the research department of the World Bank and a consultant for the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the U.S. Congressional Budget Office. Professor Chen’s research areas include multinational firms, international trade, and regional trade agreements. Her work has been published in academic journals such as the Review of Economics and Statistics, American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, Journal of International Economics, and Journal of Development Economics. She is a co-editor of Economic Inquiry and an associate editor of Economic Modeling.

Campaign Finance Rules and Wealth of Politicians

Monday, June 21, 2021
9 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. EDT
via Zoom

We were pleased to invite you to a new webinar series, “Facing Inequality”, hosted by the Institute for International Economic Policy. This virtual series focuses on current and emerging inequality issues in the U.S. and around the globe. The series brings attention to aspects of inequality being made increasingly relevant by the current COVID-19 pandemic and associated crises. The series is organized under the stewardship of IIEP Director James Foster, Oliver T. Carr, Jr. Professor of International Affairs and Professor of Economics, and IIEP Faculty Affiliate Trevor Jackson, Assistant Professor of History. The series is co-sponsored by the GW Interdisciplinary Inequality Series, co-organized by Prof. Jackson from the Department of History and Prof. Bryan Stuart from the Department of Economics. The inaugural event in the series featured Branko Milanovic.

The goal of the series is to bring together historians, economists, sociologists, political scientists, and epidemiologists, both within the academy and without, to present their work and to discuss both their ideas and methods, with the intention of working towards new interdisciplinary approaches to the problem of inequality. This is a platform for dialogue and debate, and will help cultivate a community of current and future researchers and practitioners. We invite you to engage with us in this series of important discussions.

In many countries, the political elites appear to be dominated by wealthy individuals. One commonly cited reason is the nature of the campaign finance system. Weak limits on campaign spending and rules protecting the role of outside funding may be especially advantageous for well-off candidates, given their greater ability to self-finance and stronger connections to deep-pocketed donors. While intuitive, this conjecture has scarcely been studied systematically across countries due to the lack of comprehensive data on politicians’ wealth. At the same time, insights on the topic from the U.S. are difficult to generalize from its highly idiosyncratic campaign finance regime. Drawing on newly-collected data from asset disclosures in a number of countries around the world, the paper examines cross-nationally the extent to which the variation in elected officials’ wealth is correlated with differences in limits on campaign spending. The paper further explores potential mechanisms by which campaign spending caps affect the composition of political elites by exploiting the recent campaign finance reforms enacted in Brazil and Chile.

Meet the Speakers: 

Marko Klašnja is an assistant professor at Georgetown University, with a joint appointment in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and the Government Department. He holds a PhD in political science (NYU, 2015). In 2014-2015, Marko was a visiting scholar at the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics, Princeton. His research focuses on democratic accountability and the inequalities in political representation, with a special focus on the electoral fortunes of corrupt politicians, the role of parties in democratic accountability, the causes and consequences of politicians’ wealth, and the political attitudes and preferences of wealthy individuals. At Georgetown, Marko teaches courses on comparative political economy and quantitative research methods.

Nina Eichacker is an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Rhode Island. She earned her PhD at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Her work synthesizes Post Keynesian economic theory with International Political Economy to better understand the effects of globalization, financial liberalization, and public intervention in neoliberalism and beyond. Her teaching interests lie in critical macrofinance, money and banking, and the economics of globalization.

 

 

Tim Shenk is an assistant professor in the department of history at GW and co-editor of Dissent. He is currently working on two books. The first, based on his dissertation and under contract with Princeton University Press, examines the emergence of the idea of “the economy” in the United States during the twentieth century. The second explores the intellectual history of the American political elite from the writing of the Constitution down to the present. Tentatively titled The Golden LineThe People, The Powerful, and the American Political Tradition, it is under contract with Farrar, Straus, & Giroux.

IMF Global Financial Stability Report: Preempting a Legacy of Vulnerabilities

Tuesday, May 11, 2021
10:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.
via Zoom

About the speaker:

Andrea Deghi is a Financial Sector Expert in the Global Financial Stability Analysis Division of the IMF’s Monetary and Capital Markets Department. In his role, he led Chapter 3 of April 2021 GFSR aimed to identify financial stability risks arising from the commercial real estate market and to discuss policy tools available to mitigate such risks. Previously, he worked in the Macroprudential Policy and Financial Stability Department at the ECB and with the Research Department of the Deutsche Bundesbank. His research spans topics in systemic risk, financial intermediation, real estate markets and monetary policy. Andrea holds a PhD in Economics jointly awarded by the Universities of Siena, Florence and Pisa.

Discussants:

Picture of Adolfo BarajasAdolfo Barajas is a Senior Economist in the IMF’s Monetary and Capital Markets Department, leading the work for analytical chapters of the Fund’s Global Financial Stability Report since 2017. He has also worked in other departments of the Fund: leading training activities for government officials in the Institute for Capacity Development, as a desk economist for Central American and Caribbean countries in the Western Hemisphere Department, and coordinating the Regional Economic Outlook for the Middle East and Central Asia department. Early in his career he worked as a research economist in Colombia’s central bank and at Fedesarrollo, a private think tank in Bogotá. He has written research papers on financial stability, financial development and inclusion, macroeconomic effects of remittances, monetary and exchange rate policy, and dollarization. He received his doctorate in Economics from Stanford University, and his undergraduate degree in Economics from the Universidad de los Andes.

Globalizing Patient Capital: The Political Economy of Chinese Finance in the Americas

Friday, April 30, 2021
9 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. EDT
via Zoom

The Institute for International Economic Policy and the GW Elliott School of International Affairs Book Launch Series was pleased to invite you to a book launch discussion of Prof. Stephen B. Kaplan’s Globalizing Patient Capital: The Political Economy of Chinese Finance in the Americas (Cambridge University Press).

China’s overseas financing is a distinct form of “patient capital” that marshals the country’s vast domestic resources to create commercial opportunities internationally. Its long-term risk tolerance and lack of policy conditionality has allowed developing economies to sidestep the fiscal austerity tendencies of Western markets and multilaterals. Professor Stephen B. Kaplan will discuss his new book, Globalizing Patient Capital: The Political Economy of Chinese Finance in the Americas, which examines China’s state-led capitalism, and the costs and benefits of state versus market approaches to development. In the talk, Professor Kaplan explores how patient capital affects national-level governance across the Americas and beyond, including how Chinese leaders might react to developing nation’s ongoing struggles with debt and dependency.

The book launch was also part of our 13th annual Conference on China’s Economic Development and U.S.-China Economic Relations. The conference took place as a virtual series. This conference was co-sponsored by the Sigur Center for Asian Studies, the GW Center for International Business Education and Research, the Latin American & Hemispheric Studies Program (LAHSP) at GW, the GW Department of Political Science, and the Elliott School Book Launch Series.

Meet the Speaker:

Stephen Kaplan is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs. Professor Kaplan’s research and teaching interests focus on the frontiers of international and comparative political economy, where he specializes in the political economy of global finance and development, the rise of China in the Western Hemisphere, and Latin American politics.

Professor Kaplan joined the GWU faculty in the fall of 2010 after completing a postdoctoral research fellowship at the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance at Princeton University and his Ph.D at Yale University. While at Yale, Kaplan also worked as a researcher for former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo at the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization. Prior to his doctoral studies, Professor Kaplan was a senior economic analyst at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, writing extensively on developing country economics, global financial market developments, and emerging market crises from 1998 to 2003.

Meet the Discussants:

Picture of Carol WiseProfessor Carol Wise, Department of Political Science and International Relations, University of Southern California (USC), has written widely on trade integration, exchange rate crises, institutional reform, and the political economy of market restructuring in the Latin American region. Wise is author of the book, Dragonomics: How Latin America is Maximizing (or Missing Out) on China’s International Development Strategy (Yale University Press, 2020), which received USC’s Phi Kappa Phi Faculty Recognition Award in 2021 and the Luciano Tomassini 2021 Award-Honorable Mention for the Best Book on International Relations from the Latin American Studies Association. Professor Wise’s most recent journal articles include: “Playing both Sides of the Pacific: Latin America’s Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with China,” Pacific Affairs (2016); “Conceptualizing China-Latin America Relations in the 21 st Century” (with Victoria Chonn Ching), The Pacific Review (2017); and, “International Trade Norms in the Age of Covid-19” (with Nicolas Albertoni), Fudan Humanities and Social Science Journal (2020). Professor Wise has held Fulbright Grants to Canada, Mexico, and Peru. She is a member of the core social science faculty at Renmin University’s annual International Summer Program, Beijing. In 2019, Wise was the Fulbright-Masaryk University Distinguished Chair in the Czech Republic. Her latest research compares the political economy of development in Latin America and Central/Eastern Europe.

Picture of Roselyn HsuehRoselyn Hsueh is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Temple University in Philadelphia, where she codirects the Certificate in Political Economy. She is the recipient of the Fulbright Global Scholar Award for research in India, Mexico, and Russia. Her next book, Micro-Institutional Foundations of Capitalism: Sectoral Pathways to Globalization in China, India, and Russia, is under contract with Cambridge University Press. She is the author of China’s Regulatory State: A New Strategy for Globalization (Cornell, 2011), and scholarly articles and book chapters. BBC World News, The Economist, Foreign Affairs, National Public Radio, The Washington Post, and other media outlets have featured her research. She has testified before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission and consulted for The Center for Strategic and International Studies. Dr. Hsueh has served as a Global Order Visiting Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania, member of the Georgetown Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues, and Residential Research Faculty Fellow at U.C. Berkeley. She also lectured as a Visiting Professor at Tecnológico de Monterrey in Mexico. She held the Hayward R. Alker Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Southern California and conducted international fieldwork in China, Japan, and Taiwan as a U.S. Fulbright Scholar and David L. Boren National Security Fellow. She earned her B.A. and doctorate in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley.

Meet the Moderator: 

Jay Shambaugh is Professor of Economics and  International Affairs, and Co- Director of the Institute for International Economic Policy at the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University. His area of research is macroeconomics and international economics. He has had two stints in public service. He served as a Member of the White House Council of Economic Advisors from 2015-2017. Earlier, he served on the staff of the CEA as a Senior Economist for International Economics and then as the Chief Economist. He also spent 3 years as the Director of the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution. Jay is also a Faculty Research Fellow at the NBER and Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Economic Studies at Brookings. Prior to joining the faculty at George Washington, Jay taught at Georgetown and Dartmouth and was a visiting scholar at the IMF. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.A. from the Fletcher School at Tufts, and a B.A. from Yale University.

International Monetary Fund’s Spring 2021 World Economic Outlook

Friday, April 23, 2021
1:30 pm – 3:00 pm EDT
via Zoom

Agenda

1:30 – 1:35 p.m.     Welcoming Remarks:

Jay Shambaugh, George Washington University 

1:35 – 2:05 p.m.     Chapter 1: Global Prospects and Policies 

Presenter: Malhar Nabar, International Monetary Fund

Discussant: Karen Dynan, Harvard University and Peterson Institute

2:05 – 2:30 p.m.     Chapter 2: After Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Prospects for Medium-Term Economic Damage

Presenter: Sonali Das, International Monetary Fund

Discussant: Danny Leipziger, George Washington University

2:30 – 2:55 p.m.     Chapter 3: Recessions and Recoveries in Labor Markets: Patterns, Policies, and Responses to the COVID-19 Shock

Presenter: Francesca Caselli, International Monetary Fund

Discussant: Kristen Broady, Hamilton Project, Brookings and Dillard University

2:55 – 3:00 p.m.      General Q&A and Concluding Remarks

Read the full World Economic Outlook here.

Chapter 1: Global Prospects and Policies

Although the contraction of activity in 2020 was unprecedented in living memory, extraordinary policy support prevented even worse economic outcomes. Global growth is projected at 6% in 2021, moderating to 4.4% in 2022, revised up from the October 2020 WEO. The upward revision reflects additional fiscal support in a few large economies, the anticipated vaccine-powered recovery in the second half of 2021, and continued adaptation of economic activity to subdued mobility. High uncertainty surrounds this outlook, related to the pandemic’s path, the effectiveness of policies as a bridge to vaccine-powered normalization, and the evolution of financial conditions. Much remains to be done to beat back the pandemic and avoid persistent increases in inequality within countries and divergence across economies.

Chapter 1 Presenter:

Picture of Malhar NabarMalhar Nabar heads the World Economic Studies division in the IMF’s Research Department, which produces the World Economic Outlook (WEO). In previous roles in the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department he covered China and Japan, and was mission chief for Hong Kong, SAR. Malhar’s research interests are in financial development, investment, and productivity growth. Before joining the IMF in 2009, he was an Assistant Professor of Economics at Wellesley College. He holds a Ph.D. from Brown University.

 

Chapter 1 Discussant:

Picture of Karen DynanKaren Dynan is a Professor of the Practice in the Harvard University Department of Economics and at the Harvard Kennedy School. She previously served as Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy and Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of the Treasury from 2014 to 2017. From 2009 to 2013, Dynan was vice president and co-director of the Economic Studies program at the Brookings Institution. Before that, she was on the staff of the Federal Reserve Board, leading work in macroeconomic forecasting, household finances, and the Fed’s response to the financial crisis. Dynan has also served as a senior economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisers (2003-2004) and as a visiting assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University (1998). Her current research focuses on fiscal and other types of macroeconomic policy, consumer behavior, and household finances. She is also currently a nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Dynan received her Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University and her A.B. from Brown University.

Chapter 2:  After-Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Prospects for Medium-Term Economic Damage

This chapter examines the possible persistent damage (scarring) that may occur from the COVID-19 recession and the channels through which they may occur. Expected medium-term output losses from the pandemic are substantial, at about 3 percent lower than pre-pandemic anticipated output for the world in 2024. The degree of expected scarring varies across countries, depending on the structure of economies and the size of the policy response. To limit scarring, policymakers should continue to provide support to the most-affected sectors and workers while the pandemic is ongoing. Remedial policies for the setback to human capital accumulation, measures to lift investment, and initiatives to support reallocation will be key to address long-term GDP losses.

Chapter 2 Presenter:

Picture of Sonali DasSonali Das is a senior economist in the World Economic Studies Division in the IMF’s Research Department. Previously, she worked in the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department, where she covered China, India, Nepal, and Fiji. Her research interests include monetary policy, investment, and financial stability. She holds a PhD in economics from Cornell University.

 

Chapter 2 Discussant:

Picture of Danny LeipzigerDr. Danny Leipziger is Professor of International Business and International Affairs at George Washington University, where he is concurrently the Managing Director of the Growth Dialogue. Professor Leipziger has been a faculty member in the highly-ranked International Business Department since 2009, where he has taught both undergraduate and graduate courses on macroeconomics, applied development, financial crises, and international economics, and he has taught in the GW/IFC/Milken Capital Markets Graduate Program for mid-career government officials since its inception. He has been advisor to the governments of South Korea, Vietnam, Ivory Coast, Uzbekistan, Argentina, and South Africa, among others.

A former Vice President for Poverty Reduction and Economic Management at the World Bank (2004-2009), he served three World Bank Presidents and held senior management positions in the East Asia and Latin America Regions. While at the World Bank, he led the team preparing the emergency financial bailout loan to Korea in 1997. He was the World Bank’s Director for Finance, Private Sector and Infrastructure for Latin America (1998-2004). He served previously in the U.S. Department of State, and was a Member of the Secretary’s Policy Planning Staff.

Dr. Leipziger was Vice Chair of the Spence Commission on Growth and Development and he served on the WEF Council on Economic Progress. An economist with a Ph. D. from Brown University, he has published widely in development economics, finance and banking, and on East Asia and Latin America. He is the author of several books, including Lessons of East Asia (U. of Michigan Press), Stuck in the Middle (Brookings Institution), and Globalization and Growth and more than 50 refereed and published articles in journals and other outlets. He is frequent contributor to VoxEU, Project Syndicate, and other media, and he has appeared on Bloomberg, BBC, an CCTV and Korean TV as expert commentator.

Chapter 3:  Recessions and Recoveries in Labor Markets: Patterns, Policies, and Responses to the COVID-19 Shock

The labor market fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic shock continues, with young and lower-skilled workers particularly hard-hit. This chapter examines the labor market consequences of the crisis, how it compares with previous shocks, and how policies can help. Preexisting employment trends favoring a shift away from jobs that are more vulnerable to automation are accelerating. Policy support for job retention is extremely powerful at reducing scarring and mitigating the unequal impacts from the acute pandemic shock. As the pandemic subsides and the recovery normalizes, a switch toward worker reallocation support measures could help reduce unemployment more quickly and ease the adjustment to the permanent effects of the COVID-19 shock on the labor market.

Chapter 3 Presenter:

Picture of Francesca CaselliFrancesca Caselli is an economist in the World Economic Studies Division of the IMF Research Department. Previously, she worked in the Systemic Issues Division of the Research Department and in the European Department, participating to Article IV missions to Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Before joining the IMF, she worked at the OECD and visited the Bank of Italy. She holds a Ph.D. in International Economics from the Graduate Institute in Geneva.

 

Chapter 3 Discussant:

Kristen Broady is a Fellow with the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program.  She is the Barron Hilton Endowed Full Professor of Financial Economics on leave at Dillard University in New Orleans.  She previously served as Visiting Professor of Economics at Howard University, Alabama A&M University, Department Chair of Business and Economics at Fort Valley State University, Vice Provost for Graduate Studies at Kentucky State University and as a visiting faculty member at Jiangsu Normal University in Xuzhou, China. Dr. Broady served as a consultant for the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies in Washington, D.C.; a senior research fellow for the Center for Global Policy Solutions in Washington, D.C.; a consultant for the City of East Point, Georgia and as an HBCU consultant for season two of The Quad on Black Entertainment Television (BET) in Atlanta. Her areas of research include racial wealth disparities, mortgage foreclosure risk, labor and automation, and racial health disparities. She earned a BA in criminal justice at Alcorn State University and an MBA and PhD in business administration with a major in economics at Jackson State University.

Rethinking Financial Regulation for the 21st Century

Wednesday, March 24, 2021
12:30pm – 2:00pm
via WebEx

This event was joint with GW Law Business and Finance Law program and featured Professor Emeritus Arthur E. Wilmarth, Jr. and discussant Professor Erik Gerding.

The financial crisis of 2007-09 and the pandemic crisis of 2020 showed that global financial markets are dangerously unstable. Those markets are dominated by “too-big-to-fail” universal banks – commercial banks that engage in capital markets activities – and large shadow banks, such as private equity firms, securities broker-dealers, and hedge funds. Governments and central banks rescued financial markets in 2008 and 2020 with enormous bailouts and unconventional monetary policies. Those policy measures produced soaring global debt levels, aggressive risk-taking by investors, heavily indebted sovereigns, and bloated central bank balance sheets. In addition, large technology companies are seeking to enter the banking business, a development that could transform the banking industry and extend government bailouts for banks across our commercial economy. The seminar discussed regulatory policies that would return our financial system to a structure that is much more stable and far less dependent on government bailouts.

This webinar was moderated by Dr. Sunil Sharma, Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the Institute for International Economic Policy, with introductory remarks made by IIEP Co-Director Jay Shambaugh and Director of the Business and Finance Law Program at the George Washington University Law School Jeremiah Pam. This event was co-sponsored by the GW Law School’s Business and Finance Law Program and the Institute for International Economic Policy at GWU.

About the speaker:
Picture of Arthur WilmarthArthur E. Wilmarth, Jr. joined the GWU faculty in 1986, after 11 years in private law practice. Prior to joining GW Law’s faculty, he was a partner in the Washington, DC, office of Jones Day. During his 34 years as a member of the faculty, Professor Wilmarth taught courses in banking law, contracts, corporations, professional responsibility, and American constitutional history. He served as Executive Director of the Center for Law, Economics & Finance from 2011 to 2014.
Professor Wilmarth is the author of Taming the Megabanks: Why We Need a New Glass-Steagall Act (Oxford University Press, 2020), and co-editor of The Panic of 2008: Causes, Consequences, and Implications for Reform (Edward Elgar, 2010). He has published more than 40 law review articles and book chapters in the fields of financial regulation and American constitutional history. In 2005, the American College of Consumer Financial Services Lawyers awarded him its prize for the best law review article published in the field of consumer financial services law during the previous year.
Professor Wilmarth has testified before committees of the US Congress, the California legislature, and the DC Council on financial regulatory issues. In 2010, he was a consultant to the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, the body established by Congress to report on the causes of the financial crisis of 2007-09. During 2008-2009, he served as Chair of the Section on Financial Institutions and Consumer Financial Services of the Association of American Law Schools, after serving as the Section’s Chair-Elect and Annual Program Chair during 2007-2008. Professor Wilmarth is a member of the international advisory board of the Journal of Banking Regulation, published by Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. He is also a member of the advisory board of the American Antitrust Institute.

About the discussant:
Picture of Erik GerdingErik Gerding is a Professor at the University of Colorado Law School. His research interests include securities, banking law, the regulation of financial markets, products, and institutions, payment systems, and corporate governance. His research also focuses on the application of technology to financial regulation, including analyzing the use of technologies in governing financial markets. Professor Girding’s book Law, Bubbles, and Financial Regulation (2014) examines the interaction of asset price bubbles and financial regulation. Prior to joining academia, Professor Gerding practiced law in the New York and Washington D.C. offices of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP. His practice at the firm included representing clients in the financial services and technology industries in an array of financial transactions and regulatory matters.

About the moderators:
Picture of Sunil SharmaSunil Sharma is a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the Institute for International Economic Policy, Elliott School of International Affairs, The George Washington University, Washington, D.C., USA, and a Senior Associate at the Council on Economic Policies, Zurich, Switzerland. He was Assistant Director in the IMF’s Research Department from 2015-2018, and the Director of the IMF- Singapore Regional Training Institute (STI) in Singapore from 2006-2015. Before moving to Singapore in 2006, he was Chief of the IMF Institute’s Asian Division in Washington, D.C. Prior to joining the IMF in 1992, Dr. Sharma was on the Economics faculty at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He has a Ph.D. and M.A. in Economics from Cornell University, a M.A. from the Delhi School of Economics, and a B.A. (Honors) from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University. His current interests include rethinking capitalism and democracy, systemic hazards, complex systems, the international financial architecture, and the institutional structure and design of financial regulation.

Jay Shambaugh is Professor of Economics and International Affairs, and Co- Director of the Institute for International Economic Policy at the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University. His area of research is macroeconomics and international economics. He has had two stints in public service. He served as a Member of the White House Council of Economic Advisors from 2015-2017. Earlier, he served on the staff of the CEA as a Senior Economist for International Economics and then as the Chief Economist. He also spent 3 years as the Director of the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution. Jay is also a Faculty Research Fellow at the NBER and Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Economic Studies at Brookings. Prior to joining the faculty at George Washington, Jay taught at Georgetown and Dartmouth and was a visiting scholar at the IMF. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.A. from the Fletcher School at Tufts, and a B.A. from Yale University.

Picture of Jeremy PamJeremiah Pam is the Director of the Business and Finance Law Program at George Washington University Law School. He has extensive work experience in international affairs and international crises, including six years practicing in international finance and sovereign debt restructuring at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP in New York, followed by government service as a financial diplomat and strategist with the Treasury Department in Baghdad and Washington, and with the State Department in Kabul. Mr. Pam teaches courses on financial stability, international crises, and economic and technological innovation. He also served for four years as a U.S. Air Force officer prior to law school. Mr. Pam received a JD from Columbia, an MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an MA in Political Science from Columbia, and an AB from Harvard.

 

China’s Outward Investments: State Capitalism or Capital Flight?

Friday, March 5, 2021
9:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m.
via Webex

The Institute for International Economic Policy was pleased to invite you to the 13th annual Conference on China’s Economic Development and U.S.-China Economic Relations. The conference took place as a virtual series. The conference was co-sponsored by the Sigur Center for Asian Studies and the GW Center for International Business Education and Research.

In this event, Professor Meg Rithmire discussed the nature of China’s outward investments. Deborah Brautigam (JHU-SAIS) and Stephen Kaplan (GWU) provided discussant remarks. IIEP Co-Director Jay Shambaugh moderated the discussion.

Global observers are increasingly focused on China’s “state capitalism” and its implications for trading partners and host countries. Disentangling the strategic and commercial motives for Chinese firms abroad is not straightforward, and some of Chinese companies’ global efforts subvert, rather than execute, the Chinese state’s strategic goals. In this talk, based on research on the changing role of the state in China’s economy and the internationalization of Chinese capital over the last decade, I characterize China’s approach to globalization as a series of campaigns and experiments with constant adjustments and focus on the reach and limits of the Chinese party-state.

Meet the Presenter:

Picture of Meg RithmireMeg Rithmire is F. Warren MacFarlan associate professor in the Business, Government, and International Economy Unit. Professor Rithmire holds a PhD in Government from Harvard University, and her primary expertise is in the comparative political economy of development with a focus on China and Asia. Her first book, Land Bargains and Chinese Capitalism (Cambridge University Press, 2015), examines the role of land politics, urban governments, and local property rights regimes in the Chinese economic reforms. A new project, for which Meg conducted fieldwork in Asia 2016-2017, investigates the relationship between capital and the state and globalization in Asia. The project focuses on a comparison of China, Malaysia, and Indonesia from the early 1980s to the present. The research has two components; first, examining how governments attempt to discipline business and when those efforts succeed and, second, how business adapts to different methods of state control.

Meet the Discussants:

Stephen KaplanStephen B. Kaplan is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs. Professor Kaplan’s research and teaching interests focus on the frontiers of international and comparative political economy, where he specializes in the political economy of global finance and development, the rise of China in the Western Hemisphere, and Latin American politics.

 

 

Picture of Dr. brautigamA leading expert on China in Africa, Professor Brautigam is the author of Will Africa Feed China? (Oxford University Press, 2015), The Dragon’s Gift: The Real Story of China in Africa (Oxford University Press, 2010; Chinese version published by Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Press) and Chinese Aid and African Development: Exporting Green Revolution (St. Martin’s Press, 1998). She is also co-editor of Taxation and State-Building: Capacity and Consent(Cambridge University Press, 2008) as well as numerous articles published in academic journals and public affairs media. Professor Brautigam regularly advises international agencies and governments on China-Africa economic engagement.

Picture of Jay ShambaughJay Shambaugh is a Professor of Economics and International Affairs, and Co-Director of the Institute for International Economic Policy at the George Washington University. Professor Shambaugh’s area of research is macroeconomics and international economics. His work includes analysis of the interaction of exchange rate regimes with monetary policy, capital flows, and trade flows as well as studies of international reserves holdings, country balance sheet exchange rate exposure, the cross-country impact of fiscal policy, the crisis in the euro area, and regional growth disparities.
He has had two stints in public service. He served as a Member of the White House Council of Economic Advisors from 2015-2017. Earlier, he served on the staff of the CEA as a Senior Economist for International Economics and then as the Chief Economist. He also spent 3 years as the Director of the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution. He is also a Faculty Research Fellow at the NBER and Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Economic Studies at Brookings.

Prior to joining the faculty at George Washington, Shambaugh taught at Georgetown and Dartmouth and was a visiting scholar at the IMF. Shambaugh received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.A. from the Fletcher School at Tufts, and a B.A. from Yale University.

India’s Federal Finances in COVID Times: The 15th Finance Commission

Wednesday March 10th, 2021
9:00 – 10:30am EST
via Webex

This was the eighth webinar in the “Envisioning India” series, co-sponsored by the Sigur Center for Asian Studies and the Institute for International Economic Policy. It is a platform for dialogue and debate. We invited you to engage with us in this series of important discussions.

The “Envisioning India” series is organized under the stewardship of IIEP Co-Director James Foster, Oliver T. Carr, Jr. Professor of International Affairs and Professor of Economics, and IIEP Distinguished Visiting Scholar Ajay Chhibber. The eighth event on “India’s Federal Finances in COVID Times: The 15th Finance Commission” featured NK Singh, Chairman of India’s 15th Finance Commission, with Junaid Kamal Ahmad of the World Bank and Indira Rajaraman as discussants. The discussion was moderated by IIEP Co-Director Jay Shambaugh.

The concept of the Finance Commission is embedded in the constitutional history of India. In a sense, it is even older than our Constitution. The Finance Commission has been described as the balancing wheel in the Constitution because it is designed to correct the structural and inherent imbalances between the resources and the expenditure of the Union and the States. The correction of this imbalance would constitute the basis for a fair vertical devolution.

The Fifteenth Finance Commission (FC-XV) was constituted by the President under Article 280 of the Constitution on 27 November 2017.The title of the report ‘Finance Commission in Covid Times’, submitted to the President for the period 2021-26, itself speaks of the onerous task it had in hand when the pandemic had significantly impacted the economy and shrunk the overall pie of resources. The Union government, in its action taken report on the commission’s report tabled in Parliament on 1st February 2021 accepted most of the recommendations.

About the Speaker:

photo of N.K. SinghN.K. Singh is a prominent Indian economist, academician, and policymaker. He is currently Chairman of the 15th Finance Commission. Prior to this position, he served as a member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha, from 2008 to 2014. He also presided as Chairman of the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Review Committee (FRBM) in 2016.

 

 

About the Discussants:

photo of Junaid Kamal AhmadJunaid Kamal Ahmad is the Country Director for the World Bank in India. He joined the World Bank’s Delhi office on 1 September 2016. Junaid, a Bangladeshi national, was formerly the Chief of Staff to World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim. He joined the World Bank in 1991 as a Young Professional and worked on infrastructure development in Africa and Eastern Europe. He has since held several management positions, leading the Bank’s program in diverse regions including Africa, the Middle East and North Africa, as well as in India and South Asia. He holds a PhD in Applied Economics from Stanford University, an MPA from Harvard University, and a BA in Economics from Brown University.

Indira Rajaraman holds a PhD in Economics from Cornell University. She was previously Professor of Economics at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, and Reserve Bank of India Chair Professor at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, Delhi. She also served as a member of the 13th Finance Commission; and Member of the Central Board of Directors, Reserve Bank of India and of the Technical Advisory Committee for Monetary Policy. She has over 75 research publications in international and national journals and edited volumes and writes regularly in the financial press. She was a member of several official committees that shaped the process of financial and fiscal reform over the last three decades.

IMF World Economic Outlook

Schedule

9:30 – 9:45  Opening Remarks: Maggie Chen, Director, Institute for International Economic Policy, George Washington University 
9:45 – 10:15 

Chapter 1: Global Prospects and Policies 

• Presenter: Malhar Nabar, Deputy Division Chief, WEO Division, Research Department, International Monetary Fund 

10:15 – 10:30  Coffee Break 
10:30 – 11:15 

Chapter 2: The Rise of Corporate Market Power and Its Macroeconomic Effects 

• Presenter: Romain Duval, Advisor to the Chief Economist, Research Department, International Monetary Fund

• Discussant: Zia Qureshi, Visiting Fellow, Global Economy and Development, Brookings Institution

11:15 – 11:30  Coffee Break 
11:30 – 12:15 

Chapter 3: The Price of Capital Goods: A Driver of Investment Under Threat? 

• Presenter: Natalija Novta, Economist, WEO Division, Research Department, International Monetary Fund
• Discussant: Paulo Bastos, Senior Economist, DECTI, World Bank

12:15  Concluding Remarks

 

Maggie Chen

George Washington University 

Maggie Chen is a professor of economics and international affairs at The George Washington University. Her areas of research expertise include foreign direct investment, international trade, and regional trade agreements and her work has been published extensively in academic journals such as American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, and Journal of International Economics. She has worked as an economist in the research department of the World Bank, a trade policy advisor at the U.S. Congressional Budget Office leading policy analysis on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, and a consultant for various divisions of the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation advising issues ranging from foreign direct investment and technical trade barriers to the Belt and Road Initiative and contributing to various World Bank flagship studies and the World Development Report. She is a co-editor of the Economic Inquiry. Professor Chen received her Ph.D. and M.A. in Economics from the University of Colorado at Boulder and her B.A. in Economics from Beijing Normal University. 

Malhar Nabar 

International Monetary Fund 

Malhar Nabar is Deputy Division Chief in the World Economic Studies Division, where he is part of the core team that produces the WEO. In previous roles at the IMF, Malhar has covered China and Japan, and was Mission Chief to Hong Kong SAR. Prior to joining the IMF, Malhar taught at Wellesley College. His research interests are in investment and productivity growth, and he has published in various journals including Journal of Development Economics, Economic Inquiry, and Journal of Macroeconomics. He holds a PhD from Brown University and a BA from Oxford University. 

Romain Duval 

International Monetary Fund 

Romain Duval is an advisor to the Chief Economist in the IMF Research Department, where he also leads the Structural Reforms Unit. Previously he was the division chief for Regional Studies of the IMF Asia Pacific Department and led the Regional Economic Outlook. Prior to joining the Fund, he was the division chief for Structural Policies Surveillance at the OECD Economics Department, where he was also the editor of the flagship publication Going for Growth. He has published extensively in leading academic and policy-oriented journals on a wide range of topics including the economics and political economy of labor and product market regulations, growth, productivity, trade, monetary policy, equilibrium real exchange rates, and climate change economics. Over the years his research has also been profiled numerous times in leading global newspapers and magazines such as The Economist, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg. 

Zia Qureshi 

Brookings Institution 

Zia Qureshi is a Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution. He also advises and consults for several other organizations. His research and commentary cover a broad range of global economic issues, including a recent focus on how technology is reshaping the economic agenda. He has published widely on these issues. Prior to joining Brookings, he worked at the World Bank and the IMF for thirty-five years, holding several leadership positions, including serving as Director, Development Economics, at the Bank and as Executive Secretary of the Joint Bank-Fund Ministerial Development Committee. He represented the Bank at major international forums, including the G20. He led a number of Bank and Fund flagship publications. He holds a DPhil in Economics from Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. 

Natalija Novta 

International Monetary Fund 

Natalija Novta is an Economist at the IMF’s Research Department, where she works on the World Economic Outlook. She previously worked in the Western Hemisphere and the Fiscal Affairs Departments contributing to the Regional Economic Outlook and the Fiscal Monitor, respectively. Before joining the Fund, she worked at the Fiscal Council of Serbia, the Serbian Ministry of Finance, and the National Bureau of Economic Research. She holds a PhD in Economics from New York University, and a BA from Harvard University. Her research has focused on economic development, conflict, climate change, trade flows, and public sector employment. She has published at the Quarterly Journal of Economics, Journal of the European Economic Association, Journal of Conflict Research and International Tax and Public Finance. 

Paulo Bastos 

World Bank 

Paulo Bastos is a Senior Economist with the Development Research Group of the World Bank in the Trade and International Integration Unit (DECTI). His research interests include the drivers of firm performance in export markets, links between globalization and technological change, and the distributional impacts of trade and FDI. His recent research exploits large administrative data sets to address these topics. He has published in scholarly journals such as the American Economic Review, Journal of International Economics, Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Industrial Economics and International Journal of Industrial Organization. Prior to joining the World Bank, he held positions at the Research Department of the Inter-American Development Bank, the European Commission and the University of Nottingham. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Nottingham and a B.A. in Economics from the University of Porto. 

Financing the Sustainable Development Goals

Wednesday, April 10th 2019 8:00 AM – 9:30 AM

Lindner Family Commons

 

Information: The last few years have witnessed a seismic shift in investors’ attitudes and demand for social and economic investments in emerging markets. Impact investing, ESG, Green Finance and SDGs are among many of the words that have recently populated investment committees and investor conferences as well as boardrooms. Leveraging GWU’s IIEP Visiting Scholar’s work on Assessing and Monitoring the Addis Ababa Action Agenda (AAA) and Citi’s GPS research, UN’s SDG: Pathways to Success- A Systemic Framework for Aligning Investment, the event will provide the opportunity to evaluate the progress of SDG financing and to appraise the degree of mobilization of private sector capital in support of the SDGs. Within this analytical context, market participants — issuers, investors, Development Financial Institutions (DFIs) and donors — will discuss the advances and challenges of financing sustainable development. The forum will seek to address the means to scale private sector capital investment, the need to institutionalise SDG financing instruments and structures and the critical contributions that public sector actors, such as donor agencies, can make to realize the “disruption” of the development aid paradigm. The discussion will also touch upon the importance of data capture and disclosure as it relates to the impact and outcomes of the SDG’s investments.  

Agenda

7:30–8:00am: Breakfast and Registration 8:00–8.05am: Welcome Remarks

  • Maggie Chen, Director, Institute for International Economic Policy, GWU
  • Julie Monaco, Managing Director, Global Head Public Sector Group, Corporate and Investment Bank, Citi

8:058:20am: Setting the Stage (Presentations of Relevant Research)

  • Ajay Chhibber, Visiting Scholar, Institute for International Economic Policy, GWU
  • Jason Channell, Head of Social & Responsible Investment Research, Citi

 8:209:30am: High-Level Panel Discussion and Audience Q&A Panelists

  • Denis Duverne, Chairman, Board of Directors, AXA
  • Mahmoud Mohieldin, Senior Vice President, 2030 Development Agenda, United Nations Relations, and Partnerships, World Bank
  • Donna Sims Wilson, President, Smith Graham & Co.
  • Sean Jones, Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator, Food Security, USAID
  • Tim Turner, Group Chief Risk Officer, African Development Bank

 

Organizing Committee: Peter Sullivan (Citi), Ajay Chhibber, Kyle Renner, Sunil Sharma (all George Washington University), and Andreas (Andy) Jobst (World Bank)

Drug Money and Bank Lending: The Unintended Consequences of Anti-Money Laundering

March 2019

Tomas Williams, Pablo Slutzky, and Mauricio Villamizar-Villegas

IIEP Working Paper 2019-5

Abstract: We explore the unintended consequences of anti-money laundering (AML) policies. For identification, we exploit the implementation of the SARLAFT system in Colombia in 2008, aimed at controlling the flow of money from drug trafficking into the financial system. We find that bank deposits in municipalities with high drug trafficking activity decline after the implementation of the new AML policy. More importantly, this negative liquidity shock has consequences for credit in municipalities with little or nil drug trafficking. Banks that source their deposits from areas with high drug trafficking activity cut lending relative to banks that source their deposits from other areas. We show that this credit shortfall negatively impacted the real economy. Using a proprietary database containing data on bank-firm credit relationships, we show that small firms that rely on credit from affected banks experience a negative shock to investment, sales, size, and profitability. Additionally, we observe a reduction in employment in small firms. Our results suggest that the implementation of the AML policy had a negative effect on the real economy.

JEL Classification: K42, G18, G21

Keywords: money laundering; organized crime; financial system; bank lending; liquidity; economic growth

How ETFs Amplify the Global Financial Cycle in Emerging Markets

January 2018

Updated: September 2018

Tomas Williams, Nathan Converse, and Eduardo Levy-Yeyati.

IIEP Working Paper 2018-1

Abstract: Since the early 2000s exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have grown to become an important investment vehicle worldwide. In this paper, we study how their growth affects the sensitivity of international capital flows to the global financial cycle. We combine comprehensive fundlevel data on investor flows with a novel identification strategy that controls for unobservable time-varying economic conditions at the investment destination. For dedicated emerging market funds, we find that the sensitivity of investor flows to global financial conditions for equity (bond) ETFs is 2.5 (2.25) times higher than for equity (bond) mutual funds. In turn, we show that in countries where ETFs hold a larger share of financial assets, total cross-border equity flows and prices are significantly more sensitive to global financial conditions. We conclude that the growing role of ETFs as a channel for international capital flows amplifies the incidence of the global financial cycle in emerging markets.

JEL Classification: F32, G11, G15, G23

Keywords: exchange-traded funds; mutual funds; global financial cycle; global risk; push and pull factors; capital flows; emerging markets

Do Fed Forecast Errors Matter?

August 2018

Tara Sinclair, Pao-Lin Tien, & Edward N. Gamber 

IIEP Working Paper 2016-14

Abstract: In order to make forward-looking policy decisions, the Fed relies on imperfect forecasts of future macroeconomic conditions. If the Fed’s forecasts are rational, then the difference between the actual outcome and the Fed’s forecast can be treated as an exogenous shock. We investigate the effect of the Fed’s forecast errors on output and price movements under the assumption that the Fed intends to implement policy through a forward-looking Taylor rule with perfect foresight. Our results suggest that although the absolute magnitude of the Fed’s forecast error shock is large, the impact of the shock on the macroeconomy is reassuringly small.

Keywords: Federal Reserve, Taylor rule, forecast evaluation, monetary policy shocks

JEL Classification: E32; E31; E52; E58