Global Economic Prospects is a World Bank Group Flagship Report that examines global economic developments and prospects, with a special focus on emerging market and developing economies, on a semiannual basis (in January and June). Each edition includes analytical pieces on topical policy challenges faced by these economies.
This report addresses the escalating global water crisis characterized by continental drying ? the long-term decline in freshwater availability across large landmasses, highlighting trends, causes and impacts on jobs, the economy, and the planet.
Competition is a core element of economic growth, but empirical evidence on how competition affects productivity in the Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region is limited. This study fills this gap with state-of-the-art empirical research, drawing on firm surveys in the formal sector and novel domestic competition enforcement datasets.
Objectives, Behavioral Responses, and Technological Advances
This report re-evaluates taxation in Latin America and the Caribbean, expanding the focus from collection efficiency and equity to include economic growth as a key objective. It examines how taxpayer behavior and technological advancements affect the effectiveness and trade-offs of core taxes, and calls for a nuanced, context-specific approach.
This report argues that resilience to climate change will ultimately depend on the adaptation decisions of millions of individual households, farms, and firms. The report offers several broad principles to guide policy and proposes specific policy actions to build resilience.
How Governments Can Promote Early Childhood Development in the Middle East and North Africa
The report documents the extent to which governments in the Middle East and North Africa currently support children?s healthy physical growth, social-emotional and mental health, and early learning, and mitigate the potential for permanent harm that arises from poverty, maltreatment, and conflict.
Initial teacher education is the first stage in teachers' career-long professional development. This report analyzes how primary school teachers are prepared across the world and identifies lessons and guiding principles that can help improve the quality of teacher preparation mechanisms.
Volume 2 - Investing in Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness, and Response
Provides practical guidance for countries to prevent, prepare for, and respond to pandemics amid fragmented global cooperation. Drawing on COVID-19 lessons, it identifies key priorities to build resilient systems that protect lives and economies through evidence-based national and regional actions.
Taxes, Benefits, and Incentives in Latin America and the Caribbean
This report aims to deepen our understanding of informality of work and employment outcomes in Latin American and Caribbean labor markets, focusing on the interplay between personal income taxation, social protection policies, and consequently firm and workers' incentives to (in)formalize agreements.
