tailieunhanh - Saving in Developing Countries: An Overview

To date, and with the presentation of the results of the bottom-up exercise, the first of the above-mentioned points has been addressed, through a process involving close coordination between the Spanish and international authorities (ECB, the EC, the EBA and the IMF), and the support of the latter. The exhaustive nature of the exercise conducted should be highlighted, as it has entailed the work of more than 400 auditors in the review of more than 115,000 operations, and of six national and international appraisal companies performing more than million house appraisals. The other two objectives are under. | THE WORLD BANK ECONOMIC REVIEW VOL. 14 NO. 3 393-414 Saving in Developing Countries An Overview Norman Loayza Klaus Schmidt-Hebbel and Luis Servén This article reviews the current state of knowledge on the determinants of saving rates presenting the main findings and contributions of the recently completed World Bank research project Saving Across the World. The article discusses the basic design of the research project and its core database the World Saving Database. It then summarizes the main project results and places them in the context of the literature on saving identifying the key policy and nonpolicy determinants of private saving rates. Special attention is paid to the relationship between growth and saving and the impact of specific policies on saving rates. The article concludes by introducing the studies included in this special issue. Saving rates around the world vary widely on average East Asia saves more than 30 percent of gross national disposable income gndi while Sub-Saharan Africa saves less than 15 percent. Regional differences have been rising over the past three decades saving rates have doubled in East Asia and stagnated in SubSaharan Africa and in Latin America and the Caribbean figure 1 . Should these disparities make saving a policy concern In theory there is little reason why countries facing different income streams preferences or demographics and subject to different types of shocks should choose similar saving rates. In practice however the intertemporal choices that underlie saving are subject to a host of externalities market failures and policy-induced distortions that are likely to drive saving away from socially desirable levels. Some market imperfections such as the unavailability of risk-sharing instruments overly stringent mandatory saving schemes or outright Soviet-style rationing can lead to socially excessive saving. Others such as too little government saving or the negative effect on retirement saving of an anticipated .