We discuss regional disparities in economic performance and living standards. We first set out some key facts, and provide a conceptual framework to help analyze whether such disparities are efficient, or instead reflect market and/or policy failures. We examine whether policy attempts to reduce...

In the context of the U.K. government’s EMU entry condition of cyclical convergence, this paper (i) provides further evidence suggesting that historically the U.K.’s business cycle has been more volatile than, and relatively independent of, the cycles in the euro-area countries; and (ii)...