Life on Earth is conspicuously more diverse in the tropics. Although this intriguing geographical pattern has been linked to many biotic and abiotic factors, their relative importance and potential interactions are still poorly understood. The way in which latitudinal changes in ecological conditions influence evolutionary processes is particularly controversial, as there is evidence for both a...

This paper introduces a new way to measure divergence of output across countries. It measures how productivity, technology or output per worker in each country follow the global frontier. We find that during the years 1970-2008 most countries followed the global frontier only partially, so they diverged from it. We use the tools of ‘development accounting’ to measure by how much countries follo...

Changes to forest production drivers (light, water, temperature, and site nutrient) over the last 55 years have been documented in peer-reviewed literature. The main objective of this paper is to review documented evidence of the impacts of climate change trends on forest productivity since the middle of the 20th century. We first present a concise overview of the climate controls of forest pro...

The indicator of specific (per capita) electricity consumption (SEC) is stabilising in developed countries and increasing developing economies. At least since the mid-2000s, difference between two groups terms available power has been decreasing. In contrast to this trend, transition Russia a market economy characterised by divergence regions SEC. SEC regions, being on average similar that Neth...

In this article we investigate the effect of product market regulation on the international diffusion of productivity shocks. The results indicate that regulations that restrict competition slow the process of adjustment through which best practice production techniques diffuse across borders and new technologies are incorporated into the production process. This effect is reflected in cross-co...