Both the German federal as well as the general government recorded a surplus for the fourth time in a row in 2017. The fast consolidation after the Great Recession coincided with the transition period for the full introduction of the federal debt brake, which is sometimes interpreted as...

We analyse the long-run imbalances of finance-dominated capitalism underlying the present crisis - which began in 2007 - with a focus on developments in the US and Germany. We argue that beyond inefficient regulation of the financial sector, the severeness of the present crisis has been mainly...

Fiscal policy in the Euro area is still dominated by austerity measures implemented under the institutional setting of the 'reformed' stability and growth pact, and the even stricter 'fiscal compact'. At the same time, calls for a more expansionary fiscal policy to overcome the economic crisis...

Many observers consider the German 'debt brake' beyond criticism. In the current crisis, many European countries have difficulties refinancing their budgets, while the German treasury's funding conditions are most favourable. The 'fiscal compact's' call for the introduction of German-style 'debt...

Currently fiscal policies in Germany seem to be in a very comfortable position and the German Debt Brake is regarded as an institutional precondition for this success and has been exported to the Euro area in the guise of the Fiscal Compact. In this paper we scrutinize German fiscal policies and...

The Euro area is currently going through its worst period of recession and economic stagnation since the Great Depression and World War II. The article tries to give an impression of the extraordinary degree of fiscal austerity and the devastating economic effects it has already had and must be...

The aim of our contribution is to present an innovative instrument to teach macroeconomics at the undergraduate and master level. We develop a digital learning platform to present and explore some controversies at the very foundations of macroeconomic theory. For this purpose, we explicitly...

Nach Berechnungen des DIW Berlin ist das Bruttoinlandsprodukt im Euroraum im ersten Quartal 2002 um 0,3 % gestiegen; dies entspricht einer laufenden Jahresrate von 1,2 %. Damit scheint die konjunkturelle Schwäche vom vergangenen Jahr allmählich abzuklingen. Die leichte Erholung ist vor allem...

Spaniens überdurchschnittlich hohes Wachstum in den vergangenen Jahren darf nicht darüber hinwegtäuschen, dass die Wirtschaftspolitik noch erhebliche strukturelle Probleme lösen muss. Die beeindruckende binnenwirtschaftliche Expansion ist in erster Linie das Ergebnis der für Spanien stark...

Die spürbare Belebung der Konjunktur in der Europäischen Währungsunion (EWU) im dritten Quartal 1999 setzte sich zum Jahresende fort (Abbildung 1). Nach Berechnungen des DIW stieg das reale Bruttoinlandsprodukt im vierten Quartal - ebenso wie schon im dritten - saisonbereinigt um 0,9 %, was...