Assessing Bias and Accuracy in the World Bank-IMF's Debt Sustainability Framework for Low-Income Countries /

The World Bank and the IMF have adopted a debt sustainability framework (DSF) to evaluate the risk of debt distress in Low Income Countries (LICs). At the core of the DSF are empirically-based thresholds for each of five different measures of the debt burden (the 'debt threshold approach'...

ver descrição completa

Detalhes bibliográficos
Autor principal: Berg, Andrew
Outros Autores: Berkes, Enrico, Pattillo, Catherine, Presbitero, Andrea
Formato: Periódico
Idioma:English
Publicado em: Washington, D.C. : International Monetary Fund, 2014.
Colecção:IMF Working Papers; Working Paper ; No. 2014/048
Acesso em linha:Full text available on IMF
Descrição
Resumo:The World Bank and the IMF have adopted a debt sustainability framework (DSF) to evaluate the risk of debt distress in Low Income Countries (LICs). At the core of the DSF are empirically-based thresholds for each of five different measures of the debt burden (the 'debt threshold approach' DTA). The DSF contains a rule for aggregating the information contained in these five different variables which we label the 'worst-case aggregator' (WCA) in view of the fact that the DSF considers a breach of any one of the thresholds sufficient to indicate a high risk of debt distress. However, neither the DTA nor the WCA has heretofore been subject to empirical testing. We find that: (1) the DTA loses information relative to a simple proposed alternative; (2) the WCA is too conservative (predicting crises too often) in terms of the loss function used in the DSF; and (3) the WCA is less accurate than some simple proposed alternative aggregators as a predictor of debt distress.
Descrição do item:<strong>Off-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required
<strong>On-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required
Descrição Física:1 online resource (39 pages)
Formato:Mode of access: Internet
ISSN:1018-5941
Acesso:Electronic access restricted to authorized BRAC University faculty, staff and students