Person:
Hallward-Driemeier, Mary

Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions

Fields of Specialization

Private sector development, Firm dynamics, Firm Productivity, Entrepreneurship, Women's economic empowerment, Investment climate, Gender, Development Economics

ORCID

0000-0003-0076-9744

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RePEc
Google Scholar
Brookings Institution

Departments

Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions

Last updated: January 31, 2023

Biography

Mary Hallward-Driemeier is Senior Economic Adviser in the Equitable Growth, Finance and Institutions Vice Presidency at the World Bank, overseeing its analytical agenda on private sector development. She joined the World Bank in 1997 as a Young Professional. She has published widely on firm productivity, the economics of technological change and the impact of crises. She leads the Jobs and Economic Transformation special theme for the International Development Association (IDA). She has served as advisor to two World Bank’s Chief Economists, co-manager of the Jobs Group, and Deputy Director for the World Development Report 2005: A Better Investment Climate for Everyone. Her previous books include Trouble in the Making? The Future of Manufacturing-Led Development (with Gaurav Nayyar) and Enterprising Women: Expanding Economic Opportunities in Africa. Mary received her AB from Harvard, her MSc in Development Economics from Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, and her PhD in Economics from MIT.

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Publication Search Results

Now showing 1 - 10 of 29

At Your Service?: The Promise of Services-Led Development
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2021-09-15) Nayyar, Gaurav; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Davies, Elwyn
Throughout history, industrialization has been synonymous with development. However, the trend of premature deindustrialization and the spread of automation technologies associated with Industry 4.0 has raised concerns that the development model based on export-led manufacturing seen in East Asia will be harder for hitherto less industrialized countries to replicate in the future. Can services-led development be an alternative? Contrary to conventional wisdom, the features of manufacturing that were considered uniquely conducive for productivity growth - such as international trade, scale economies, inter-sectoral linkages, and innovation - are increasingly shared by the services sector. But services are not monolithic. The twin gains of productivity growth and large-scale job creation for relatively low-skilled workers are less likely to come together in any given services subsector. The promise of services-led development in the future will be strengthened to the extent that technological change reduces the trade-off between productivity and jobs, and growth opportunities in services with potential for high productivity do not depend on a manufacturing base. Considering technological change and linkages between sectors while differentiating across types of services, this book assesses the scope of a services-driven development model and policy directions that maximize its potential.
Trouble in the Making?: The Future of Manufacturing-Led Development
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2017-09-20) Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Nayyar, Gaurav
Globalization and new technologies are impacting the desirability and feasibility of what has historically been the most successful development strategy. Manufacturing has been seen as special, promising both productivity gains and job creation. But trade is slowing. Global value chains (GVC) are maturing. Robotics, artificial intelligence, 3D printing, and the Internet of things are shifting what makes locations attractive for production and threatening significant disruptions in employment. There is a risk of increased polarization, within countries and across countries. Shifting the attention from high-income countries, this report takes the perspective of developing countries to ask: -- If new technologies reduce the importance of low-wage labor, how can developing countries compete? -- Do countries need to industrialize to develop? -- How can countries at different levels of development take advantage of new opportunities? Development strategies need to broaden. Different manufacturing sub-sectors can still provide productivity growth or jobs; fewer can deliver both. Many of the pro-development characteristics traditionally associated with manufacturing--tradability, scale, innovation, learning-by-doing--are increasingly features of services. With faster diffusion of technology, it will be all the more important for countries to improve the enabling environment, remain open to trade, and support capabilities of firms and workers to ensure future prosperity is shared.
Empowering Women : Legal Rights and Economic Opportunities in Africa
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2012-10-04) Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Hasan, Tazeen
This book looks at the effect of legal and economic rights on women's economic opportunities. It focuses on entrepreneurship because women in Africa are active entrepreneurs, and the links between property rights and the ability to enter contracts in one's own name affect entrepreneurial activities. The laws that are the focus of this book are not business laws and regulations, which are generally gender blind and presuppose that individuals can own property or enter into contracts. Instead, the book examines family, inheritance, and land laws, which oft en restrict these rights in ways that hurt women. This book surveys constitutions and statutes in all 47 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa to document where gender gaps in these laws impinge on women's legal capacity, property rights, or both. The book also looks at some labor law issues, such as restrictions on the types of industries or hours of work in which women may engage and provisions for equal pay for work of equal value. These laws affect women as employees and influence the attractiveness of wage employment versus entrepreneurship. They were also selected because they affect the choice of enterprise women may run. The equal pay for work of equal value provisions are also of interest as an indicator of the recognition of women's broader economic rights. This book provides a series of indicators that show whether a country does or does not provide particular legal provisions. Several points are worth emphasizing in interpreting these indicators. First, the indicators are binary; there is no attempt to differentiate between small and large gender gaps. Second, the indicators are not used to generate an index or otherwise aggregate the indicators; no weights are given to differentiate the relative importance of different sets of laws. Third, the indicators reflect whether certain legal provisions are recognized in a country or not; because the link between the indicator and gender gaps is not always straightforward, care must be taken in making value judgments. Although some indicators reveal that women are treated equally or identify gender differences in treatment, others do not. Although recognition of these sources of law can have implications for women's rights, it does not necessarily imply that women's rights are stronger or weaker. Conversely, the inclusion of some protections for women's rights may reflect not the strong standing of women but rather the fact that gender equality is not seen as axiomatic and needs to be explicitly stated. Second and third chapters focus on formal rights and how they have been upheld in court decisions. Fourth chapter examines the gap between laws on the books and practice on the ground. Fifth chapter looks at how both the substance of law and women's access to justice issues can be improved to expand women's ability to pursue economic opportunities.
Investment Climate and International Integration
(World Bank, Washington, D.C., 2004-06) Dollar, David; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Mengistae, Taye
Drawing on recently completed firm-level surveys in Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Honduras, India, Nicaragua, Pakistan, and Peru, this paper investigates the relationship between investment climate and international integration. These standardized surveys of large, random samples of firms in common sectors reveal how firms experience bottlenecks and delays in hard infrastructure such as power and telecom as well as in soft infrastructure such as customs administration. The authors focus primarily on measures of the time or monetary cost of different bottlenecks (e.g., days to clear goods through customs, days to get a telephone line, sales lost to power outages). For many of these costs, the obstacles are lower in China than in the South Asian or Latin American countries. There is also systematic variation across cities within countries. The authors estimate a probit function for the probability that a randomly chosen firm is foreign-invested and a separate probit for the probability that a randomly chosen firm is an exporter. These measures of international integration are higher where investment climate is better. For locations to take advantage of opportunities in the international market, they need good infrastructure and a sound regulatory environment. The interaction of openness and sound investment climate creates a good environment for investment and production. This paper helps explain why China has been so successful over the past decade, both in terms of integration and of rapid growth, while other countries have had varied success.
Europe 4.0: Addressing the Digital Dilemma
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-11-09) Fengler, Wolfgang; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Aridi, Anwar; Nayyar, Gaurav; Gill, Indermit; Aridi, Anwar
This report examines the underlying economics of different types of digital technologies. It highlights what the new drivers of change are, why the dynamics with this latest round of technological change may be different, and what the distributional impacts may be within and across countries. It then examines the evidence for how different digital technologies are – or are not – contributing to competitiveness and opportunities for small and young firms, and firms in less developed areas, and what can be done about it. Europe faces a digital dilemma. European firms are particularly strong in operational technologies such as smart robotics and 3D printing. While this helps Europe's competitiveness, it also widens the divide between large and small firms, and leading and lagging regions. On the other hand, digital technologies, such as transactional technologies or matching platforms, have the greatest potential for market inclusion and convergence, but this is where Europe remains less competitive. The report lays out how Europe 4.0 is attainable. The COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic has highlighted the importance of the data economy — and raised the risks if the digital dilemma is not addressed. This report provides a framework, evidence and recommendations on how governments can respond. Europe has the chance to attain a dynamic and inclusive technologically enhanced future, it should take that chance.
How Business Is Done and the ‘Doing Business’ Indicators : The Investment Climate When Firms Have Climate Control
(2011-02-01) Pritchett, Lant; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary
This paper examines de jure and de facto measures of regulations, finding the relationship between them is neither one for one, nor linear. "Doing Business" provides indicators of the formal time and costs associated with fully complying with regulations. Enterprise Surveys report the actual experiences of a wide range of firms. First, there are significant variations in reported times to complete the same transaction by firms facing the same formal policy. Second, regulatory compliance appears "under water" as firms report actual times much less than the Doing Business reported days. Third, the data reveal substantial differences between favored and disfavored firms in the same location. Favored firms show minimal variation, so Doing Business has little predictive power for the times they report. For disfavored firms, the variation is greater, although still not significantly correlated with Doing Business. Fourth, where multiple Enterprise Surveys are available, there is little association over time, with reductions in Doing Business days as likely to be accompanied by increases in Enterprise Surveys days. Comparing these two types of measures suggests very different ways of thinking about policy versus policy implementation, what "a climate" for firms in a country might mean, and what the options for "policy reform" really are.
Can Minimum Wages Close the Gender Wage Gap?: Evidence From Indonesia
(Wiley, 2015-11-18) Waxman, Andrew; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Rijkers, Bob
Using manufacturing plant-level census data, this paper demonstrates that minimum wage increases in Indonesia reduced gender wage gaps among production workers, with heterogeneous impacts by level of education and position of the firm in the wage distribution. Paradoxically, educated women appear to have benefitted the most, particularly in the lower half of the firm average earnings distribution. By contrast, women who did not complete primary education did not benefit on average, and even lost ground in the upper end of the earnings distribution. Minimum wage increases were thus associated with exacerbated gender pay gaps among the least educated, and reduced gender gaps among the best educated production workers. Unconditional quantile regression analysis attests to wage compression and lighthouse effects. Changes in relative employment prospects were limited. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions. http://olabout.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-820227.html
Do Bilateral Investment Treaties Attract Foreign Direct Investment? Only a Bit ... and They Could Bite
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-08) Hallward-Driemeier, Mary
Touted as an important commitment device that attracts foreign investors, the number of bilateral investment treaties (BITs) ratified by developing countries has grown dramatically. The author tests empirically whether BITs have actually had an important role in increasing the foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to signatory countries. While half of OECD FDI into developing countries by 2000 was covered by a BIT, this increase is accounted for by additional country pairs entering into agreements rather than signatory hosts gaining significant additional FDI. The results also indicate that such treaties act more as complements than as substitutes for good institutional quality and local property rights, the rationale often cited by developing countries for ratifying BITs. The relevance of these findings is heightened not only by the proliferation of such treaties, but by recent high profile legal cases. These cases show that the rights given to foreign investors may not only exceed those enjoyed by domestic investors, but expose policymakers to potentially large-scale liabilities and curtail the feasibility of different reform options. Formalizing relationships and protecting against dynamic inconsistency problems are still important, but the results should caution policymakers to look closely at the terms of agreements.
Big Constraints to Small Firms’ Growth? Business Environment and Employment Growth across Firms
(2009-08-01) Aterido, Reyes; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Pages, Carmen
Using data on more than 56,000 enterprises in 90 countries, this paper finds that objective conditions in the business environment vary substantially across firms of different sizes and that there are important non-linearities in their impact on employment growth. The paper focuses on four areas: access to finance, business regulations, corruption, and infrastructure. The results, particularly on the impacts of finance and corruption on growth, depend on whether and how the analysis accounts for the possible endogeneity of the business environment. Controlling for endogeneity revises the finding that small firms benefit most from access to finance, particularly for sources of finance associated with investment and growth. The findings are also sensitive to how small is defined. Differentiating micro (less than 10 employees) from other small firms shows that, while small firms can be disadvantaged in such an environment, micro firms tend to be proportionally less affected by a weak business climate and, on occasion, it can help them to grow. Overall, allowing different size classifications provides insights into the impact of the business environment that are lost in more aggregate analyses.
The Investment Climate and the Firm : Firm-Level Evidence from China
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-03) Wallsten, Scott; Hallward-Driemeier, Mary; Xu, Lixin Colin
The importance of a country's "investment climate" for economic growth has recently received much attention. The authors address the general lack of appropriate data for measuring the investment climate and its effects. The authors use a new survey of 1,500 Chinese enterprises in five cities to more precisely define and measure components of the investment climate, highlight the importance of firm-level data for rigorous analysis of the investment climate, and investigate empirically the effects of this comprehensive set of measures on firm performance in China. Overall, their firm-level analysis reveals that the main determinants of firm performance in China are international integration, entry and exit, labor market issues, technology use, and access to external finance.