We investigate to what extent the business cycles in Europe have become more synchronised since the sixties, using the classical business cycles framework. Four Bry & Boschan-like procedures for dating the turning points are compared. It is found that the cycles across countries have become more...

There are still problems in handling diversity in economics. The general equilibrium model itself lacks determinacy for a generic population of economic agents. In an ourstanding contribution, Jean-Michel Grandmont (1992) argues that increasing behavioural heterogeneity makes aggregate...

We investigate the dynamics of a cobweb model with heterogeneous beliefs, generalising the example of Brock and Hommes (1997). We examine situations where the agents form expectations by using either perfect foresight, or a form of adaptive expectations with limited memory defined from the last...

This paper compares two alternative theories of Aggregate supply, both with a "New Keynesian Flavor". The first assumes that prices are rigis due to the existence of menu costs of the kind advanced by Mankiw [38] and Akerlof and Yellen [2]. The second derives price stickiness endogenously as one...

Using annual US data for gross domestic product originating by sector between 1947 and 1997 it is shown that a negative long-run relationship between inflation and the markup is present across the sectors as well as in the aggregate. A preliminary explanation based on indutry structure is...

This paper introduces a new regression model - Markov-switching mixed data sampling (MS-MIDAS) - that incorporates regime changes in the parameters of the mixed data sampling (MIDAS) models and allows for the use of mixed-frequency data in Markov-switching models. After a discussion of...

The development of models for variables sampled at different frequencies has attracted substantial interest in the recent econometric literature. In this paper we provide an overview of the most common techniques, including bridge equations, MIxed DAta Sampling (MIDAS) models, mixed frequency...

Forecast models that take into account unbalanced datasets have recently attracted substantial attention. In this paper, we focus on different methods pro- posed so far in the literature to deal with mixed-frequency and ragged-edge datasets: bridge equations, mixed-data sampling (MIDAS), and...

This paper provides evidence on the reliability of euro area real-time output gap estimates, including those provided by the IMF, OECD and EC and a set of model based measures. A genuine real-time data set is used, including vintages of several sets of euro area output gap estimates available...

This paper provides real time evidence on the usefulness of the euro area output gap as a leading indicator for inflation and growth. A genuine real-time data set for the euro area is used, including vintages of several alternative gap estimates. It turns out that, despite some difference across...