What role can better quality of public finances play in supporting Europe's long-term economic growth prospects? This question was at the centre of the 2008 European Commission workshop on public finances. It was largely motivated by the pressures put on European economies and their budgets from...

In the advent of postal market liberalization in several European countries we expect that the incumbent operators anticipate entry by competitors who are not required to offer universal service, i.e. coverage of the entire country and uniform pricing. The market for postal service exhibits...

Given the coexistent EU priorities concerning the competitiveness of European industries and international emissions regulation at the company level, this paper assesses the efficiency and competitiveness implications of linking the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) to emerging trading schemes...

Energy markets and energy-intensive industries in all EU member states especially in Germany are subject to a diverse set of policies related to climate change. We analyse the potential efficiency losses from simultaneous application of emission taxes and emissions trading in qualitative and...

This paper studies monetary and fiscal policies in the euro area. It discusses the process of policy competition and the structure of policy cooperation. As to policy competition, the focus is on competition between the European central bank, the German government, and the French government. As...