On Friday, 13 August 1982, Finance Minster Jesus Silva Herzog of Mexico made a series of visits to the International Monetary Fund, the Federal Reserve, and the U.S. Treasury. His message to each was the same: Mexico could no longer continue to service its debt. Thus began a dramatic weekend of negotiations that marked the end of the preceding decade's buoyant expansion of developing country debt and the start of a still continuing response to the sudden collapse.

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The economic historian is well aware of the philanthropic origins of savings banks. Both in Western Europe and the United States they were initially established by public spirited individuals as a depository for the funds of small savers. It is not so widely appreciated that such banks were encouraged officially as a part of social policy in England during the nineteenth century. In an age in which self-help and individual thrift were conceived as the only solutions for lower-class poverty and distress, a means of spreading such virtues was sure not to go unnoticed. Brought forward in those critical years at the end of the Napoleonic wars, “here was the first constructive and practical proposal for counteracting the growing pauperization of the community, restoring independence to the masses, stopping the growth of the poor rate, and giving the ordinary man and woman some interest in the financial stability of the country.”

The works related to the capital structure of banks consider the requirements for minimum regulatory capital, established by the Basel agreements, as their key determinant. However, recent studies suggest that standard determinants of non-financial institutions -size, profitability, growth opportunity, tangible assets and payment of dividends, also have the power of explaining the leveraging level of banks. Thus, this work was aimed at checking whether, for those banks that hold own capital above the minimum regulatory value, the predictive capacity of standard determinants also applies to American banks that have business portfolio. As an original contribution, the work evaluated the role of the compensation program for executive managers in order to determine the capital structure of banks. The final sample was comprised by 30 banks, which observations refer to the period before (2003 to 2006) and during (2007 to 2010) the systemic crisis. The dynamic regression model with panel data confirmed the key assumption mentioned by means of the significance of the independent variables profitability and growth opportunity. At last, the variable of compensation program for executive managers has been evidenced as significant in the definition of bank leveraging, but with sign opposite to the expected one by the finance theory.

The role of the state in Latin American economic development is undergoing fundamental reconsideration. This essay focuses on the reasons underlying the new commitment to reduced state participation. In particular, I suggest that the impetus comes less from newfound ideological conviction in the virtues of the market than from ineffective macroeconomic policy in the 1980s. The principal problem confronted by the countries of the region is a fiscal shortfall, not massive inefficiency resulting from misallocation of resources. Latin America is not Eastern Europe, where reform translates into elimination of the monopoly of state ownership and the structure of central command. Latin American countries have adhered to market capitalism, but without experiencing its magical effects in recent years. It is the contest between the micro- and macroeconomic explanations that illuminates why surface agreement on a reduced state role conceals a continuing divergence of views within the region.

In the thirty years between 1950 and 1980, Latin America experienced rapid growth. During this period, output expanded at an annual rate of 5.5% with per capita increases averaging 2.7% a year. Table 1 provides country details. The star is clearly Brazil, whose share in regional product increased from less than a quarter to more than a third. At the other extreme are two groups: the Southern Cone (Argentina, Chile and Uruguay), whose mid-century leading position in the region was eroded by below average performance; and a group of smaller countries, including several in Central America. On average, Latin America's record, viewed from an immediate post-World War II perspective, is impressive. It far exceeded the target of the Alliance for Progress implemented in 1961, which called for an annual rate of 2% per capita. It also compared very favourably with European per capita income growth in the aftermath of the Industrial Revolution, which was 1.3% from 1850 to 1900 and 1.4% between 1900 and 1950. Long-term US economic growth has been at 1.8%.Yet two factors combine to make the 1950–80 Latin American growth performance seem less positive. One is its dramatic reversal in the 1980s, a period in which GDP per capita fell by 8.3%. By 1989, with the exception of Brazil, Chile, Colombia and the Dominican Republic, per capita GDP had fallen below its 1980 level. At the extreme, Venezuela, Nicaragua and El Salvador show levels below those attained in 1960. The 1980s have truly been a lost decade and thus one tends to underestimate the earlier achievement.

From the earliest time, the United States and her predecessor colonies stood close to or at the very forefront of the world in the educational attainment of the mass of the populace. The first available literacy statistics of 1840 testify to that past impressive accomplishment: overall, more than 90 per cent of white adults achieved this degree of minimum competence, and even in the laggard South the record was not significantly poorer. At that date only Scotland and Germany are comparable, with England and France much farther behind. What therefore seems to be the case is that popular education successfully preceded an extensive system of publicly supported and controlled schools.

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