The paper analyzes under what circumstances policymakers experiment with policies with uncertain outcomes, when they prefer to imitate policies initiated in other countries, and when they prefer to coordinate policies internationally. Policymakers have private costs of active policies and...

Rainer Brüderle, Bundesminister für Wirtschaft und Technologie, sieht für eine weitergehende Zentralisierung der Wirtschaftspolitik keinen Grund. Die für die jeweilige Situation eines Mitgliedstaats bestmögliche Ausgestaltung von Strukturreformen gelinge am ehesten in nationaler...

Am 1. Januar wird Slowenien als 13. Mitglied der Europäischen Währungsunion beitreten. Bulgarien und Rumänien werden zum gleichen Zeitpunkt neue Mitglieder der EU, so dass die Anzahl der potentiellen Eurokandidatenländer auf 14 anwachsen wird. Welche Auswirkungen sind von der Erweiterung der...

The paper examines the optimal combination of central bank independence and conservatism in the presence of uncertain central bank preferences. We develop a model of endogenous monetary policy delegation in which government chooses the central bank's degree of inde-pendence and conservatism so...

The paper examines the monetary-fiscal interactions in a monetary union model with uncertainty due to imperfect central bank transparency. We first show that monetary uncertainty disciplines fiscal policymakers and thereby reduces taxes, average inflation and output distortions. However, as more...

When countries need to implement costly economic policy reforms, these often imply uncertainties about their effectiveness for the home country and their spillovers to other countries. We develop a model to show that under these circumstances countries implement too few or too many policy...

What are the incentives for governments to coordinate their policies internationally when there is model disagreement and uncertainty? We build a model where countries disagree on policy targets and how policies affect the economies, and show that uncertainty not only determines the type of...