Mexico’s economic growth has been insufficient to generate convergence towards the income levels of the wealthiest OECD economies. The main reason is poor productivity growth, which highlights the importance of continuing reforms to improve education, competition and the business environment. These reforms, however, are heavily influenced by widespread informal employment and weak legal institutions that diminish the effectiveness of policies and hold back gains in productivity. In order to lift long-term economic growth, structural policy reforms will be required across multiple institutional domains, as many of the problems are interlinked. A broad effort to follow through with secondary stages of ongoing reforms is required to address informality and improve the legal system, and thereby release the shackles that restrain economic growth.