Attributing the foreign trade effects of an expansion in the state budget to a single cause cannot do justice to the multitude of macro-economic interrelationships. Both theory and observation can reveal quite differing links between the public sector financial balance, the balance of payments...

Oil price increases and the persistent OPEC current account surpluses were considered the main problems of economic development in many industrial and developing countries long after the first oil crisis. Since 1983, however, the OPEC surpluses have been completely absorbed and the official base...

At the height of the European sovereign debt crisis, the European Central Bank decided to purchase distressed European government bonds. Even worse, and more importantly, the ECB is providing direct support of several hundred billions of euros to troubled banks via its normal monetary policy...