In explaining the uneven spatial distribution of economic activity, urban economics and new economic geography (NEG) dominate recent research in economics. A main difference between these two approaches is that NEG stresses the role of spatial linkages whereas urban economics does not do so. We...

The ECB has been arguing in the past that since there is no trade-off between price stability and financial stability, the pursuit of price stability is the best a central bank can do to also maintain financial stability. We argue that there is a potential trade-off between price stability and...

In the European Union, energy markets are increasingly being liberalized. A case in point is the European natural gas industry. The general expectation is that more competition will lead to lower prices and higher volumes, and hence higher welfare. This paper indicates that this might not happen...

Distance related variables typically vary in a cross-section dimension but less so in a time dimension across cities, regions, or countries. The enlargement of the EU or the introduction of the euro, however, can be looked upon as integration shocks that are informative of the consequences of...

In this paper we suggest that Eurozone countries face a policy trade-off among: 1) a common rule imposing co-movements in fiscal policy; 2) financial stability; and 3) financial integration. We provide empirical evidence documenting the existence of such a trade-off in the period characterized...

In this paper we address the issue of how transmission uncertainty could affect the choice between a federal monetary policy based on national data and one on aggregated data.We find that the uncertainty about the transmission process increases the need to take into account information about...

In this paper we provide empirical evidence documenting the nature of the Eurozone's fragility. We find that during periods of turmoil, financial markets have tended to impose strong programs of austerity on member countries of the Eurozone. This confirms the evidence we found in a previous...

There is a wide consensus that the existence of structural rigidities in the Eurozone reduces the effectiveness of the ECB's monetary policies. In order to test this "ECB-handicap" hypothesis, we perform a meta-analysis of the effects of monetary policies in the US and the Eurozone countries....

This paper investigates the relationship between the euro-dollar exchange rate and its underlying fundamentals. First, we develop a simple theoretical model in which chartists and fundamentalists interact. This model predicts the existence of different regimes, and thus nonlinearities in the...