Why Basic Science Matters for Economic Growth
Public investment in basic research will pay for itself.
Inflation Scares in an Uncharted Recovery
A key question is what combination of events could cause persistently faster price gains.
Drawing Further Apart: Widening Gaps in the Global Recovery
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The global economic recovery continues, but with a widening gap between advanced economies and many emerging market and developing economies. Our latest global growth forecast of 6 percent for 2021 is unchanged from the previous outlook, but the composition has changed. […]
CHART OF THE WEEKHow to Reduce COVID-19’s Unequal Effects Across Workers
By Jorge Mondragon and Marina M. Tavares
Lower-skilled and young workers were among the hardest hit from the pandemic, suffering job losses in record numbers last year. Some of those jobs may never reappear as economies readjust to a post-pandemic world. […]
Divergent Recoveries in Asia: History is not Destiny
by Davide Furceri, Jonathan D. Ostry, and Anthony C.K. Tan
Asian economies are performing better than expected. In the IMF’s latest World Economic Outlook Update, we upgraded our growth estimate for 2020 by 0.7 percentage point from our previous forecast in October, to a contraction of 1.5 percent—in regional terms, a better outcome than other parts of the world. […]
How COVID-19 Will Increase Inequality in Emerging Markets and Developing Economies
By Gabriela Cugat and Futoshi Narita
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Emerging markets and developing economies grew consistently in the two decades before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, allowing for much-needed gains in poverty reduction and life expectancy. The crisis now puts much of that progress at risk while further widening the gap between rich and poor.
Despite the pre-pandemic gains in poverty reduction and lifespans, many of these countries have struggled to reduce income inequality. At the same time, they saw persistently high shares of inactive youth (i.e., those not in employment, education, or training), wide inequality in education, and large gaps remaining in economic opportunities for women. COVID-19 is expected to make inequality even worse than past crises since measures to contain the pandemic have had disproportionate effects on vulnerable workers and women.
As part of our latest World Economic Outlook we explore two facts about the current pandemic to estimate its effect on inequality: a person’s ability to work from home and the drop in GDP expected for most countries in the world.
The impact of where you work
First, the ability to work from home has been key during the pandemic. A […]
Engines Not Yet in Sync: A Multispeed Recovery in Asia
The Asia-Pacific region is recovering from its worst recession in living memory. Our latest Regional Economic Outlook shows that a recovery started in the third quarter, but growth engines are not all firing with the same power across countries, leading to a multispeed recovery. […]
A Long, Uneven and Uncertain Ascent
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The COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread with over 1 million lives tragically lost so far. Living with the novel coronavirus has been a challenge like no other, but the world is adapting. As a result of eased lockdowns and the rapid deployment of policy support at an unprecedented scale by central banks and governments around the world, the global economy is coming back from the depths of its collapse in the first half of this year. Employment has partially rebounded after having plummeted during the peak of the crisis.
This crisis is however far from over. Employment remains well below pre-pandemic levels and the labor market has become more polarized with low-income workers, youth, and women being harder hit. The poor are getting poorer with close to 90 million people expected to fall into extreme deprivation this year. The ascent out of this calamity is likely to be long, uneven, and highly uncertain. It is essential that fiscal and monetary policy support are not prematurely withdrawn, as best possible.
This is the worst crisis since the Great Depression, and it will take significant innovation on the policy front, at both […]
COVID’s Impact in Real Time: Finding Balance Amid the Crisis
By Francesco Grigoli and Damiano Sandri
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One enduring lesson from the COVID-19 pandemic is that any lasting economic recovery will depend on resolving the health crisis. […]
Finding the Right Policy Mix to Safeguard our Climate
By IMF Staff
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Unaddressed, climate change will entail a potentially catastrophic human and economic toll, but it’s not too late to change course.
Global temperatures have increased by about 1°C since the pre-industrial era because of heat-trapping green-house gases accumulating in the atmosphere. Unless strong action is taken to curb emissions of these gases, global temperatures could increase by an additional 2–5°C by the end of this century. Keeping temperatures to levels deemed safe by scientists requires bringing net carbon emissions to zero on net globally by mid-century.
…economic policy tools can pave a road toward net zero emissions by 2050 even as the world seeks to recover from the COVID-19 crisis.
In the latest World Economic Outlook we make the case that economic policy tools can pave a road toward net zero emissions by 2050 even as the world seeks to recover from the COVID-19 crisis. We show that these policies can be pursued in a manner that supports economic growth, employment and income equality.
The manageable costs of mitigation
Economic policies can help address climate change through two main channels: by affecting the composition […]