2005/08/01 by Benjamin F. Jones, Benjamin Olken · 2 citations
Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Affect (linguistics) #Autocracy #Corruption and Economic Development #Culture, Economy, and Development Studies #Democracy #Demographic economics #Economics #Law #Natural Resources and Economic Development #Political science #Politics #Power (physics) #Psychology
paper · doi:10.1162/003355305774268165
openalex publication_date 2005/08/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
Economic growth within countries varies sharply across decades.This paper examines one explanation for these sustained shifts in growth-changes in the national leader.We use deaths of leaders while in office as a source of exogenous variation in leadership, and ask whether these plausibly exogenous leadership transitions are associated with shifts in country growth rates.We find robust evidence that leaders matter for growth.The results suggest that the effects of individual leaders are strongest in autocratic settings where there are fewer constraints on a leader's power.Leaders also appear to affect policy outcomes, particularly monetary policy.The results suggest that individual leaders can play crucial roles in shaping the growth of nations."There is no number two, three, or four . . .