The 2005 Article IV Consultation for the United States reports that robust productivity growth and high corporate profits have contributed to a strong rebound in business investment and some acceleration in employment. The financial sector appears well positioned to provide continued support to...

This Selected Issues paper analyzes the United State’s (U.S.) household savings role in supporting the U.S. recovery; and focuses on the market for single-family housing, and the importance for household balance sheets. It discusses the underfunding of corporate pension plans, macroeconomic,...

Despite repeated shocks, the United States economy has provided valuable support for global growth. Executive Directors commended this development, and stressed the need to tighten fiscal and monetary policies. They welcomed the assessment of the fiscal transparency Reports on Observance of...

This Selected Issues paper summarizes estimates of the gap between current housing prices and their equilibrium levels in the United States. It examines short-term dynamics of price adjustment. Reflecting uncertainties about how to analyze underlying housing price trends, two approaches are used...

This Selected Issues paper analyzes the condition of household, corporate, and bank balance sheets; sustainability of the U.S. external current account deficit; the impact of a slowdown in the growth on the euro area economy; and the implications of the reduction in U.S. treasury securities for...

This report provides a summary of the Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) measures in place in the United States on May 2006. The report describes and analyzes those measures and provides recommendations on how certain aspects of the system could be...

Sound fiscal and monetary policies have provided a strong foundation for the longest U.S. economic expansion on record. Executive Directors agreed that the U.S. economy strength had been supported by rising real income, enhanced profitability, and rising household wealth. Directors cautioned the...

This Selected Issues paper focuses on the adoption of new technology and globalization in the United States of America, and assesses the change in the productivity growth and revised estimates, the developments in the labor market, equity prices, and the technology boom. The paper analyzes how...

The slow-paced growth rate of the U.S. economy, notwithstanding the bolstering attempts is disheartening. Implementing financial reforms and highly accommodative monetary policy are hoped to have a desired effect. Deficit reduction, debt ratio stabilizing strategies, removal of fiscal cliff...

This Selected Issues paper for the United States discusses the microeconomics of the country—household wealth and savings. Households’ consumption-saving decisions have an important bearing on the U.S. economic outlook. This paper demonstrates how households with consistently lower income,...