We construct a measure of Euro area cyclical efficiency, following the approach developed in Galí, Gertler and López-Salido (2002). Our measure –which we call "the gap"– corresponds to the inverse of price over social marginal cost. Here we present a time series of this gap for the Euro...

In this paper we integrate Schumpeterian endogenous growth into a general equilibrium framework. By explicitely modelling the innovation and technology adoption process we are able to match some stylized economic facts such as entry rates and survival times of firms in the U.S. economy or the...

In this paper we present a simple, theory-based measure of the variations in aggregate economic efficiency associated with business fluctuations. We decompose this indicator, which we refer to as “the gap”, into two constituent parts: a price markup and a wage markup, and show that the...

This paper addresses the issue of measuring the NAIRU in the Spanish economy. We implement some of the procedures proposed in the literature to estimate the NAIRU, describing their advantages and disadvantages. Our analysis shows that these alternative approaches provide significantly different...

One of the most salient feature of the Spanish housing market, compared to other European economies, is its relatively low rental share. This may be partly attributed to the existence of fiscal distortions in Spain favoring ownership. In this paper, we simulate the potential efects of different...

In recent years, for most emerging markets, public debt has decreased and its composition has evolved toward domestic currency. This progress is remarkable in terms of reduced financial vulnerability, which has been underpinned by favourable financing conditions and related deepening of local...

This paper presents an empirical analysis of transmission rates from exchange rate movements to import prices, across countries and product categories, in the euro area over the last fifteen years. Our results show that the transmission of exchange rate changes to import prices in the short run...

European finance is becoming increasingly cross-border, while the European architecture for safeguarding financial stability —including decision-making processes for providing financial-stability public goods— have remained decentralized with some explicit mechanisms for coordination across...

We analyze empirically whether the emergence of China as a large recipient of FDI has affected the amount of FDI received by Latin American countries. For the longest time span possible given data availability (from 1984 to 2001), we do not find a substitution from Latin American inward FDI to...

The computation of structural primary balances for the nine main Latin American countries and their comparison of their changes with their cyclical position during the period 1981 2004 confirms that fiscal policy is procyclical in the region. From this evidence, the paper shows strong evidence...