Switzerland is often viewed as a federalist curiosity and a unique form of direct democracy. But this view does not provide a proper understanding of the country. A theory of Switzerland is necessary. A consideration of the initial, exogenous geographical situation of Swiss territory provides a...

We examine the various senses in which economist use the term "rationality" and then outline some of the commonly drawn implications and auxiliary assumptions. Finally, we confront the implications with the empirical evidence, drawing on the insights from the exciting new field of behavioral...

Research in behavioral economics has uncovered the widespread phenomenon of people making decisions against their own good intentions. In these situations, the government might want to intervene, indeed individuals might want the government to intervene, to induce behavior that is closer to what...

This paper describes the monetary policy response of countries during the inter-war period. How did central banks react to the Great Depression? How did countries balance the externals demands of the gold standard with domestic policy pressures? What was the optimal level of international policy...

In this paper I survey and reinterpret the extensive literature on Europe's Great Depression. I argue that Europe could not exploit her vast economic potential after 1918, because the war had not yet come to an end - indeed it did not end before 1945. Both, domestic and international...

This paper analyzes the effectiveness of the tax and transfer systems in the European Union and the US to act as an automatic stabilizer in the current economic crisis. We find that automatic stabilizers absorb 38 per cent of a proportional income shock in the EU, compared to 32 per cent in the...

This paper argues that the key issue for defining and solving the Eurozone's (EZ) difficulties lies in readjusting the relationship between the centre and the periphery of the EZ. Our argument proceeds in two steps. Firstly, the basic finance problem of a centre-periphery system is captured by a...

In Germany, the employment response to the post-2007 crisis has been muted compared to other industrialized countries. Despite a large drop in output, employment has hardly changed. In this paper, we analyze the determinants of German firms' labor demand during the crisis using a firm-level...