In this paper we explore the evidence that would establish that Dutch disease is at work in, or poses a threat to, the Kazakh economy. Assessing the mechanism by which fluctuations in the price of oil can damage non-oil manufacturing and thus long-term growth prospects in an economy that relies...

This study analyses the impact of economic catching-up on annual inflation rates in the European Union with a special focus on the new member countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Using an array of estimation methods, we show that the Balassa-Samuelson effect is not an important driver of...

This paper investigates the impact of international shocks – interest rate, commodity price and industrial production shocks – on key macroeconomic variables in ten Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries by using near-VAR models and monthly data from the early 1990s to 2009. In...

This study analyses the impact of economic catching-up on annual inflation rates in the European Union with a special focus on the new member countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Using an array of estimation methods, we show that the Balassa-Samuelson effect is not an important driver of...

This paper investigates the impact of international shocks – interest rate, commodity price and industrial production shocks – on key macroeconomic variables in ten Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries by using near-VAR models and monthly data from the early 1990s to 2009. In...

Economic research has considered Private Debt a determinant of GDP growth for years. By keeping this perspective, the objective of this work is to understand how much of the GDP response to a monetary shock is due to the variation of private debt. This is the marginal contribution of private...

Mainstream economic research regards private debt as a determinant of GDP growth in the longrun. Levine (2005) surveys in details this branch of literature and explains the channels by which debt fuels growth. In this paper we switch the focus from the long to the short-run and study whether...

We propose an estimation strategy that accounts for two major problems raised in the empirical literature testing for the prevalence of the inverted U-shaped relation between environmental degradation and economic activity, namely the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis. First, we use...

A fixed exchange rate regime eliminates one degree of freedom in absorbing macroeconomic shocks. Therefore, there is a call for higher labor market flexibility in countries which are members of the monetary union or those which intend to join the monetary union. Focusing on the cross-country...

The introduction of the 2006 Norwegian shareholder income tax was announced in advance, and it increased top marginal tax rates on individual dividend income from zero to 28 percent. We document strong timing effects on dividend payout on a large panel of non-listed corporations, with a surge of...