We discuss how cross-country unemployment insurance can be used to improve international risk sharing. We use a two-country business cycle model with incomplete financial markets and frictional labor markets where the unemployment insurance scheme operates across both countries. Cross-country...

In this paper, we assess the impact of major German structural reforms from 1999 to 2008 on key macroeconomic variables. By many, these reforms, especially the Hartz reforms on the labor market, are considered to be the root of observed imbalances in the Euro Area. Our simulations within a...

Using an estimated large-scale New-Keynesian model, we assess welfare and business cycle consequences of a fiscal union within EMU. We differentiate between three different scenarios: public revenue equalisation, tax harmonisation and a centralised fiscal authority. Relative to the status quo,...

We analyse the impact of fiscal policy shocks in the euro area as a whole, using a newly available quarterly dataset of fiscal variables for the period 1981-2007. To allow for comparability with previous results on euro area countries and the US, we use a standard structural VAR framework, and...

Given the increased importance of …fiscal monitoring, this study amends the existing literature in the …field of intra-annual fi…scal data in two main dimensions. First, we use quarterly fi…scal data to forecast a very disaggregated set of …fiscal series at annual frequency. This makes...

Should rational agents take into consideration government policy announcements? A skilled agent (an econometrician) could set up a model to combine the following two pieces of information in order to anticipate the future course of fiscal policy in real-time: (i) the ex-ante path of policy as...

The paper reviews the economic risks associated with regimes of high public debt through DSGE model simulations. The large public debt build-up following the 2009 global financial and economic crisis acted as a shock absorber for output, while in the recent and more severe COVID19-crisis, an...

We present the estimated large-scale three-region DSGE model GEAR picturing Germany, the Euro Area and the Rest of the world. Compared to existing models of this type, GEAR incorporates a comprehensive fiscal block, involuntary unemployment and a complex international structure. We use the model...

Due to input-output linkages, an industry level shock can widely transmit to the rest of the economy. We identify government policies on the automobile industry, which change final prices and estimate their effect on sales and production. An example could be the scrappage schemes that many...

In a real business cycle model with labor market frictions, we find that a more progressive tax schedule reduces structural unemployment as it fosters long-run incentives for job creation. Because there exists an optimal level of unemployment in a matching environment ('Hosios condition'), tax...