Finding proper policy instruments to promote productivity growth features prominently on the Lisbon agenda and is central in many national as well as European policy debates. In view of the increased mobility of high-skilled workers in Europe, ongoing globalization and increased interregional...

This discussion paper led to an article in <I>Papers in Regional Science</I> (2014). Volume 93, Issue 2(SI).<P> The majority of cities in our world is not only connected through conventional physical infrastructure, but increasingly through modern digital infrastructure. This paper aims to test whether...</p></i>

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the impact of inequality on economic growth. Both theoretical and empirical approaches have produced ambiguous results on sign and size of this relationship. Although there is a considerable part of the literature that considers inequality...

Foreign aid’s effectiveness in promoting economic growth remains mired in controversy.We examine the impact of the volatility of aid on economic growth, controlling for the level of aid. A four-year panel analysis is conducted encompassing 155 countries over the period 1966-2001. We find that...

This paper documents that a process of industrial restructuring has been transforming the developed economies, where large corporations are accounting for less economic activity and small firms are accounting for a greatershare of economic activity. Not all countries, however, are experiencing...

In this paper, we develop two hypotheses: First, regional innovation efforts have a positive impact on regional knowledge based entrepreneurial activity. Second, knowledge based entrepreneurship positively affects regional economic performance. We test these hypotheses using county level data...

The business performance of firms in the creative high-tech sector shows much variation. This paper examines whether the geographical location of such business firms influences the performance of these firms. The overarching analysis framework of this paper emerges from the recently developed...

We analyze the interaction between bank rescues, financial fragility and sovereign debt discounts. We construct a model that contains balance sheet constrained financial intermediaries financing both capital expenditure of intermediate goods producers and government deficits. The financial...

We investigate the effectiveness of `Keynesian' fiscal stimuli when government deficits and debt rollovers are (possibly partially) financed by balance sheet constrained financial intermediaries. Because financial intermediaries operate under a leverage constraint, deficit financing of fiscal...

Recent macro developments in the euro area have highlighted the interactions between fiscal policy, sovereign debt, and financial fragility. We take a structural macroeconomic model with frictions in the financial intermediation process, in line with recent research, but introduce asset choice...