This essay brings fiscal federalism theory into contact with the knowledge perspective to economic organization. The question addressed is: can a central government be justified in the context of fiscal federalism on grounds of economic organization? We point out that if one looks at the...

The Broad Economic Policy Guidelines contain the answers of the European Commission and the governments of the EU-member countries to the European growth and employment problems. These guidelines have been the major EU-economic policy concept for around ten years now. They can be seen as a...

This paper assesses the contribution of the European Central Bank (ECB) to Germany’s ongoing economic crisis, a vicious circle of decline in which the country has become stuck since the early 1990s. It is argued that the ECB continues the Bundesbank tradition of asymmetric policymaking: the...

DNB bewaakt de stabiliteit van ons financiële stelsel via het monetaire beleid, het toezicht en de zorg voor het betalingsverkeer. Deze gezamenlijke taakuitoefening biedt belangrijke voordelen.

This paper shows theoretically that inefficient public expenditure can be institutionally curtailed by an independent central bank. An advantage of our analysis is to employ a two-country model with cash-in- advance constraints. The model can deal with fiscal policy as well as monetary policy...

This paper examines the adequacy and the consistency of the fiscal rule set by the Treaty of Maastricht and the Stability and Growth Pact. First, it shows that the functional fiscal rule is adequate in ensuring the final goal of public debt sustainability. Second, it points out that the draw of...

The paper presents a simple model for discussing the effects of deficit limits and budget rules on fiscal policy. I find that limits on deficit- output ratios provide incentives to implement procyclical policies when the economy is in intermediate states, and countercyclical policies only in...

The work of Gwartney, Holcombe and Lawson (GHL, 1998) is cited in New Zealand debate to demonstrate that a larger government share of GDP is detrimental for economic growth. Their work is reassessed here. We find a number of omissions in their analysis lead to a considerable over- statement of...

This paper describes the Federal Reserve's analytical framework under Volcker and Greenspan, as it was constructed in the early 1980s, during a period of high inflation. It traces the modeling and policy implications of this framework. It discusses the Fed's actual track record and the state of...

This paper traces the euro zone’s inadequate macroeconomic performance in recent years back to the predominance of a restrictive macroeconomic policy mix based on a ‘new monetarist’ approach to economic policy. An approach based on a (post-)Keynesian analysis is presented as a growth and...