Within the economic profession, it is a widely held view that the fiscal criteria of the Maastricht treaty are arbitrary numbers without economic foundation. Much of this criticism seems to overlook an important aspect - the strategic dimension of the criteria. This paper focuses on one...

Are the characteristics of the exchange rate regime relevant for the degree of fiscal discipline? What are the conclusions for fiscal behavior in Europe after the transition to EMU? These are the central questions that are analyzed in this paper from a theoretical point of view. After a general...

Die Bestimmungen zur europäischen Wirtschafts- und Währungsunion (WWU) im Unionsvertrag haben die Anreize für öffentliche Verschuldung verändert. Die Analyse zeigt, daß trotz der Bemühungen, die nationale Eigenverantwortlichkeit zu bewahren, nicht mit einer effektiven Disziplinierung...

Using data from a unique survey of members of parliaments in France, Germany and Italy in 2018, we estimate the effects of three dimensions on EU and euro area fiscal reform preferences: nationality, political ideology, and populism. We predict and confirm that a German populist party on the...

State-owned enterprises (SOEs) provide opportunities for a more flexible and market-based provision of public services. At the same time, they may impair fiscal transparency and offer politicians discretion in the presence of strict fiscal rules if these only constrain the core udget. Using a...

The establishment of a sovereign debt restructuring mechanism (SDRM) is one of the important issues in the academic debate on a viable constitution for the European Monetary Union (EMU). Yet the topic seems to be taboo in official reform contributions to the debate. Against this backdrop, the...

We use event study regressions to compare the impact of EU monetary versus fiscal policy announcements on government bond spreads of ten euro member countries. Our motivation is to evaluate which of the two players - the ECB or the EU fiscal level - has been more crucial for the stabilization of...