Italy has been one of the few industrial countries resorting to incomes policy in the current decade. Many Italian observers have attributed to this policy the remarkable slowdown in wage and price inflation. However, no apparent progress has been made concerning labour market unbalances, as the...

This paper investigates the behaviour of consumer and producer prices in Italy using micro data. The frequency of price changes is computed in order to obtain a quantitative measure of the unconditional degree of price rigidity at both the consumption and the production stage. On average,...

This paper addresses the issue of measuring the NAIRU for the euro area and assessing the robustness and precision of the obtained estimates. The empirical framework adopted is based on systems combining an Okun-type relationship between cyclical unemployment and the output gap with a Phillips...

Italy has been one of the few industrial countries resorting to incomes policy in the current decade. Many Italian observers have attributed to this policy the remarkable slowdown in wage and price inflation. However, no apparent progress has been made concerning labour market unbalances, as the...

This paper presents new evidence on the patterns of price and wage adjustment in European firms and on the extent of nominal rigidities. It uses a unique dataset collected through a firm-level survey conducted in 17 European countries and covering various sectors. Several conclusions are drawn...

Based on an ad hoc firm-level survey on wage and pricing policies conducted in a large number of European countries, this study finds that about 60% of firms change base wages once a year with some clustering of wage changes observed in January. Differences in the frequency of wage changes...