Bloomberg Línea Brasil reports that Latin America and the Caribbean went from 3 high income countries in 1987 to 19 in 2025 under the World Bank's updated classification, while large economies stay stuck in the middle income trap. Jonathan Fortun of the IIF said the region remains stubbornly middle income by population and that the World Bank threshold is a moving target. He also described Guyana as more an accounting leap than development and linked Bolivia's troubles to an exhausted fixed exchange rate regime.
Jonathan M. Fortun Vargas / Fiscal policy for sustainable development in the Global South, LSE International Inequalities Institute and UNU-WIDER workshop
Accepted for presentation at the LSE International Inequalities Institute and UNU-WIDER workshop on 6 November 2026. Using BOLMOD, the Bolivian module of SOUTHMOD, this paper studies how Bolivia’s fuel subsidy reform and exchange rate unification affect households. It compares the enacted compensation package with alternatives deliverable through existing registries, showing why administrative visibility matters for who receives relief.
Jonathan M. Fortun Vargas / International Proceedings of Economics Development and Research
Uses household survey evidence from four Bolivian survey years to examine how education and other household characteristics contributed to changes in inequality.