L. Paganetto - Böcker

A crucial issue in the era of globalization and internationalization, is whether the relationship between investment and finance is beneficial to growth and development. Received wisdom is that research and development is essential not only for maintaining productivity, but also for competing in the marketplace. Similar questions have been raised about education and its rate of "social return"; is education necessary for improving the skill of the workforce, or does it serve primarily to facilitate the adoption of these technologies? This book brings together international scholars to analyse the importance of education, research and human capital and the impact of financial systems on growth and development.

This volume analyzes in detail the problem of information and risk management. Both topics are a central issue in current financial and monetary economic literature. Several recent theoretical and empirical contributions consider asymmetric information between investors and financiers as a major determinant of financial risk. In this framework, we may regard financial and banking innovation as, on one hand, policy and individual agents' response to the problem of asymmetric information and risk management and, on the other, as a self generated innovation process posing new challenges to policymakers in terms of information efficiency and risk control. This volume concentrates on one of the most important directions for research on banking and finance for the next decade.