While the ECB helped mitigate the euro crisis in the aftermath of Lehman, it has stretched its monetary mandate and moved into fiscal territory. This text describes and summarises the crucial role played by the ECB in the intervention spiral resulting from its bid to manage the crisis. It also...

This paper discusses lessons that other regions could learn from European Union’s effort to implement carbon pricing through EU Emission Trading System (EU ETS). Our lessons are, first of all, that a cap-and-trade system like EU ETS is very helpful in guaranteeing a credible and binding...

While the formal decision of the ECB Council to impose interest on Target claims and liabilities is meaningless, this paper shows that the pooling of primary interest income among national central banks in the Eurozone implies that Target and cash balances do, in fact, bear an effective rate of...

The forces of the market and systems competition bring about economic and social convergence in Europe. There is no need for social policies at the EU level. Social harmonisation would distort migration flows and slow down the speed of economic convergence. National welfare states will be...

This paper studies various options to support allowance prices in the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS), such as adjusting the cap, an auction reserve price, and fixed and variable carbon taxes in addition to EU ETS. We use a dynamic computable general equilibrium model that explicitly allows...

The efficiency case for raising fuel tax minima under the EU Energy Tax Directive (ETD) appears nuanced. Some fuels may be undertaxed (e.g., road diesel, natural gas), while others may be adequately taxed already (e.g., gasoline). Reform proposals would increase some minima, including for road...

This paper estimates Nash-type fiscal reaction functions for European governments competing for revenue from diesel excises. It appears that European governments strategically set their excise levels by responding to their neighbors' tax rates. This provides evidence for the presence of tax...

The paper deals with the effects of migration resulting from EU Eastern enlargement on the welfare states of Western Europe. Although migration is good in principle, as it yields gains from trade and specialization for all countries involved, it does so only if it meets with flexible labour...

The eastern expansion of the EU resembles German unification in its mometousness. Whereas the latter led to a 26% increase in the population of the Federal Republic, the former will increase the population of the EU by 28% if all ten entry aspirants are accepted. A special problem will be posed...

The rules laid down in Article 32 of the Protocol No. 18 on the Statute of the European System of Central Banks and of the European Central Bank of the Maastricht Treaty will significantly redistribute European seignorage income and hence the implicit entitlement to the 352 billion stock of...