Monetary growth in the euro area has exceeded its target since several years. At the same time, the money demand function seems to be increasingly unstable if more recent data are used. If the link between money balances and the macroeconomy is fragile, the rationale of monetary aggregates in...

This paper examines the integration of stock markets in Germany, France, Netherlands, Ireland and UK over January 1973-August 2008 at the aggregate market and industry level considering the following industries: basic materials, consumer goods, industrials, consumer services, health care and...

We analyze the performance of the Maastricht convergence criteria (inflation, long-term interest rate, annual and overall public debt) of the European Monetary Union (EMU) that led to the introduction of the Euro on Jan. 1st 1999 as book currency. Defining 3 regimes, 1992-97, 1997-1999 and...

Output gaps for ten European countries and the USA are estimated based on a CES production function with input augmentation in the technological progress. The substitution parameter is estimated from the coefficients of the labor and capital demand functions. The estimation is done using...

Jean Pisani-Ferry's note was prepared for the European Parliament-National Parliaments Debate on How to Raise Growth in the Euro Area? in Brussels.

Visiting scholar Xavier Debrun, and Bruegel director Jean Pisani-Ferry contribute to the emerging discussion on reform strategies in the euro area. An earlier version of this note was presented to the Eurogroup Working Group of the Economic Policy Committee of the EU.

This paper discusses the creation of a European Banking Union. First, we discuss questions of design. We highlight seven fundamental choices that decision makers will need to make: Which EU countries should participate in the banking union? To which categories of banks should it apply? Which...

Five years after the first tremors in Europe's banking system, what makes the crisis unique is the absence of a democratically accountable decision-making framework; there is an 'executive deficit' that compounds Europe's democratic deficit. The author argues that the only way to resolve the...

The search for solutions to the euro crisis is based on a partial diagnosis that overemphasises the lack of enforcement of existing fiscal rules. Europe's leaders should rather address the euro area's inherent weaknesses revealed by the crisis. At the core of euro-area vulnerability is an...

Extensive prior research on the economics of European monetary union highlighted some potential risks (the known unknowns) but overlooked others (the unknown unknowns). Asymmetries among participating countries, the potentially destabilising character of a one-size-fits all monetary policy, the...