The economic effects of improving investor rights in Portugal

Portuguese Economic Journal - Tập 8 - Trang 59-97 - 2009
Rui Castro1, Gian Luca Clementi2,3
1Department of Economics and CIREQ, Université de Montréal, Montreal, Canada
2Department of Economics, Stern School of Business, New York University, New York, USA
3RCEA, Rimini, Italy

Tóm tắt

The Portuguese economy has performed remarkably well since joining the EU in 1986. Output per worker grew at an annual rate of 2.25%. The relative price of investment has declined. Real investment has increased compared to output, in part fuelled by an increase in capital inflows. At the same time, resource allocation seems to have improved as well: firm-level data shows a significant decline in the dispersion of labor productivity and size across firms. This paper argues that improvements in outside investor rights that have taken place since Portugal joined the EU is a prime candidate to explain this set of facts.

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