Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia face challenges competing on the global markets, as shown by their relatively low and stagnant export shares. The limited export competitiveness has hampered external demand, growth and employment. Applying, for the first time to North Africa, the stock-flow approach...

This paper develops a model of costly firm creation in an economy with weak institutions, costly business environment as well as skill gaps where one of the equilibrium outcomes is a low-productivity trap. The paper tests the implications of the model using a cross-sectional dataset including...

The unemployment rate in Estonia rose sharply in 2010 to one of the highest levels in the EU, after the country entered a severe recession in 2008. While the rate declined relatively rapidly in 2011, it remained high especially for the less educated. In 2009, the Employment Contract Law relaxed...

This paper studies the Balassa-Samuelson effect in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia.Time series and panel co-integration techniques are used to show that the BS effect works reasonably well in these transition economies during the period 1991:Ql to 2001:Q2.However,...

The ambition of this paper is to provide a thorough overview of equilibrium exchange rates in the acceding countries of Central and Eastern Europe.Therefore, theoretical models of equilibrium exchange rates are reviewed first and presented in a structured way.Subsequently, the existing body of...

This paper sets out to estimate equilibrium real exchange rates for the Czech Republic, Hungary, Po-land, Slovakia and Slovenia.A theoretical model is developed that provides an explanation for the ap-preciation of the real exchange rate based on tradable prices in the acceding countries.Our...

This paper investigates the equilibrium exchange rates of three Southeastern European countries (Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania), of two CIS economies (Russia and Ukraine) and of Turkey.A systematic approach in terms of different time horizons at which the equilibrium exchange rate is assessed is...

This paper analyses the ever-growing literature on equilibrium exchange rates in the new EU member states of Central and Eastern Europe in a quantitative manner using meta-regression analysis.The results indicate that the real misalignments reported in the literature are systematically...

This paper attempts to analyze the direct impact of exchange rate volatility on the export performance of ten Central and Eastern European transition economies as well as its indirect impact via changes in exchange rate regimes.Not only aggregate but also bilateral and sectoral export flows are...