This paper focuses on Austria's 2013 Article IV Consultation on economic development and policies related to labor demand and supply. Austria taxes labor heavily, and this practice explains in particular the limited labor supply of low-skilled workers and women. The IMF report highlights that...

In recent years, the IMF has released a growing number of reports and other documents covering economic and financial developments and trends in member countries. Each report, prepared by a staff team after discussions with government officials, is published at the option of the member country

This Selected Issues paper presents a comparison on public expenditure of Austria and other countries. In the past decade, Austria's government expenditure growth has been very steady, thus avoiding the boom-bust pattern of some other European countries. However, expenditure levels are...

This Report on Observance of Standards and Codes on Iceland summarizes the findings and recommendations of the assessment. This assessment of the current state of the implementation of the Basel Core Principles for Effective Banking Supervision in Iceland has been completed as a stand-alone...

The Belgian financial system is relatively large, concentrated, and interconnected and has a high level of compliance with the Basel Core Principles (BCPs) for effective banking supervision. The National Bank of Belgium (NBB) deploys high-quality supervisory practices and has clear lines of...

This Financial Sector Stability Assessment report reviews economic development and different fiscal policies in Austria. The global crisis has revealed weaknesses in Austria's financial stability policy framework, and recent changes at the European levels provide an opportunity to address these....

Belgian financial conglomerates (FCs) remained important players in the Belgian financial sector, despite significant restructuring following the global financial crisis. FCs operated in multiple streams of the financial sector, especially in banking and insurance. Owing to their economic reach...

Estonia has succeeded in reducing its macroeconomic imbalances and vulnerabilities, but faces the challenge of preserving its hard-earned fiscal and financial stability and enhancing long-term growth prospects. In this regard, adopting a fully fledged medium-term fiscal framework can help assess...

This article is a report of Spain’s progress in financial sector reforms. The key reforms in the financial sector have been either adopted or designed. The economy has risks at times as it takes up the challenges of correcting pre-crisis imbalances. The economy may face decline, but financial...