In the course of the EU enlargement process, the participation of accession countries in the European Monetary Union might lead to a significant redistribution of seigniorage wealth if current regulations prevail. In general, accession countries will be winners from this redistribution, for...

The main aim of this paper is to examine the exchange rate behavior of a group of four transitional, EU accession countries, with a view to making policy recommendations regarding their accession to full European Monetary Union. We employ a dynamic OLS panel estimator to investigate the relative...

The paper addresses the question what effects the enlargement of a monetary union will have on necessary structural reforms in the (low distortion) member countries and the (high distortion) candidate countries. While monetary union lowers reforms in the candidate countries, members of the...

Membership in a monetary union implies stronger incentives for nominal wage flexibility in the form of wage indexation and shorter contract length than nonmembership. For example, entry into a monetary union may cause a move from a non-indexation to an indexation equilibrium. But more wage...

The paper addresses the question what effects the enlargement of a monetary union will have on necessary structural refoms in the (low distortion) member countries and the (high distortion) candidate country. While monetary union lowers reforms in the candidate country, members of the monetary...

The former EU president Jean-Claude Junker has proposed that all countries of the European Union should also adopt the euro as their currency and recent research has shown that countries currently pursuing this goal indeed fulfill the classical Optimal Currency Area (OCA) criterion of positively...