As a companion piece to the Board paper on Structural Reforms and Macroeconomic Performance: Initial Considerations for the Fund, this paper presents a selection of case studies on the structural reform experiences of member countries. These papers update the Board on work since the Triennial...

This paper evaluates the performance of two alternative policy rules, a forward-looking rule and a spontaneous adjustment rule, under alternative inflation targets, in terms of output losses in a macroeconomic model, using European Union data. The simulations suggest that forward-looking rules...

This paper reviews the recent growth experience of the Greek and Portuguese economies and their determinants, comparing it with the rest of the euro area as well as a large set of other economies. Estimates from fixed effects panel and cross-section regressions are used to estimate how changes...

The methodology used in this paper has three distinguishing features: the natural rate of unemployment and potential output are jointly estimated; estimation integrates wage and price data with “real” and structural data; and third, the methodology encompasses many of the methods found in the...

Bulgaria’s potential output growth in future could be markedly lower, and it may take considerable time for the excess labor and resources to be absorbed by other sectors, in particular by the export sector. This suggests that the natural level of rate of unemployment will rise and remain...

This Selected Issues paper on Sri Lanka underlies the dynamics of growth and external competitiveness. The slowdown in the contribution of sectors that are labor intensive, together with faster growth in sectors that are capital intensive and have higher productivity levels, resulted in total...

This 2013 Article IV Consultation examines the performance of Sweden’s fiscal policies to counter effects of global financial crisis. Economic growth in Sweden has been moderate since global financial crisis of 2008–2009. The IMF report posits that with potential growth moderately...

The paper is an elaborated report on Nicaragua’s potential economic growth. The challenges and idiosyncratic shocks were immense but the policies of better education, labor contracts, and accomplishments in public investments paved the way for movement of the economy. The external...

This Selected Issues paper focuses on U.S. potential growth in the aftermath of the crisis. It discusses recent productivity developments in the nonfarm business sector. The paper uses back-of-the envelope calculations to gauge the effect of diminished financial sector activity on GDP growth in...

This note presents estimates of potential growth and the output gap in Latvia. The estimates suggest that the output has marked below potential in the early 2000s but the output gap becomes positive and large after EU accession. With unemployment still well above its natural level, the output...