This paper analyses the monetary and fiscal policy implications of output gap estimates in times of crisis. The widening of output gaps observed in major OECD economies in the wake of the recent crisis has been mainly due to total factor productivity gaps, except in the United States where it...

The world economy has experienced four global recessions over the past seven decades: in 1975, 1982, 1991, and 2009. During each of these episodes, annual real per capita global gross domestic product contracted, and this contraction was accompanied by weakening of other key indicators of global...

Chapter 1. Introduction -- Chapter 2. Evidence of six crises -- Chapter 3. Globalization, national economies, and global crises -- Chapter 4. Conceptual issues — Depressions, recessions, crisis cycles, business cycles -- Chapter 5. A world economy -- Chapter 6. Why do crises occur? Causal...