This paper reviews a substantial range of empirical evidence on whether the Phillips curve is dead, i.e. that its slope has flattened to zero. National data going back to the 1950s and 60s yield strong evidence of negative slopes and significant nonlinearity in those slopes, with slopes much...

Countries with high debt loads are vulnerable to an adverse feedback loop in which doubts by lenders lead to higher sovereign interest rates which in turn make the debt problems more severe. We analyze the recent experience of advanced economies using both econometric methods and case studies...

This paper summarizes a forthcoming book that describes issues and recent innovations in the measurement of international transactions. A number of distinguished authors assess data measuring trade in merchandise, services, and foreign-direct investment claims. Others assess international prices...

This paper reviews a substantial range of empirical evidence on whether the Phillips curve is dead, i.e. that its slope has flattened to zero. National data going back to the 1950s and 60s yield strong evidence of negative slopes and significant nonlinearity in those slopes, with slopes much...

This paper explores the link between financial conditions and economic activity. We first review existing measures, including both single indicators and composite financial conditions indexes (FCIs). We then build a new FCI that features three key innovations. First, besides interest rates and...

This paper summarizes a forthcoming book that describes issues and recent innovations in the measurement of international transactions. A number of distinguished authors assess data measuring trade in merchandise, services, and foreign-direct investment claims. Others assess international prices...

Countries with high debt loads are vulnerable to an adverse feedback loop in which doubts by lenders lead to higher sovereign interest rates which in turn make the debt problems more severe. We analyze the recent experience of advanced economies using both econometric methods and case studies...

This paper presents an empirical analysis of the factors that contributed to the unprecedented widening of the U.S. external deficit between 1980 and 1986. The paper presents an empirical model of the U.S. current account that is used to assess the relative importance of changes in U.S. price...

This paper presents a comparative study of the level of unit labor costs in the manufacturing sectors of several countries. The paper begins by surveying earlier estimates of relative productivity and unit labor cost levels and evaluating the various methodologies that have been used in previous...