TY  - JOUR
AU  - Easterly,William
AU  - Kremer,Michael
AU  - Pritchett,Lant
AU  - Summers,Lawrence H.
TI  - Good Policy or Good Luck? Country Growth Performance and Temporary      Shocks
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 4474
PY  - 1993
Y2  - September 1993
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w4474
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w4474.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
William Easterly
New York University
Department of Economics
19 W. 4th Street, 6th floor
New York NY 10012
Tel: 212/992-8684
Fax: 212/995-4186
E-Mail: william.easterly@nyu.edu

Michael Kremer
Harvard University
Department of Economics
Littauer Center M20
Cambridge, MA 02138
Tel: 617/495-9145
Fax: 617/495-7730
E-Mail: mkremer@fas.harvard.edu

Lant Pritchett
Harvard Kennedy School
79 JFK St.
Cambridge, MA 02138
Tel: 617 496 4562
E-Mail: lant_pritchett@harvard.edu

Lawrence H. Summers
Harvard Kennedy School of Government
79 JFK Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
Tel: 617/495-9322
Fax: 617/495-0436
E-Mail: lhs@harvard.edu
AB  - Much of the new growth literature stresses country characteristics, such as education levels or political stability, as the dominant determinant of growth.  However, growth rates are highly unstable over time, with a correlation across decades of .1 to .3, while country characteristics are stable, with cross-decade correlations of .6 to .9.  Shocks, especially those to terms of trade, play a large role in explaining variance in growth.  These findings suggest either that shocks are important relative to country characteristics in determining long-run growth, or that worldwide technological change determines long-run growth while country characteristics determine relative income levels.
ER  -