Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) has transformed Europe and has created an integrated pan-European economy. Much research has focused on understanding this integration process and what benefits and costs it entails. This paper identifies a political economy channel of EMU as the monetary union...

In this paper we present a two-country dynamic general equilibrium model of ex ante unequally developed countries. The model explains a key feature recently observed in transition economies – the long-run trend real exchange rate appreciation – through investments into quality. Our...

We propose a monetary model in which the unemployed satisfy the official US definition of unemployment: they are people without jobs who are (i) currently making concrete efforts to find work and (ii) willing and able to work. In addition, our model has the property that people searching for...

The monetary integration of the acceding countries will proceed in several distinct steps, starting with membership in the European Union (EU), followed by participation in the so-called Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) II and ultimately entry into the euro area. This paper addresses the question...

This paper shows that the credibility gain from permanently committing to a fixed exchange rate by joining the European Monetary Union can outweigh the loss from giving up independent monetary policy. When the central bank enjoys only limited credibility a pegged exchange rate regime yields a...

This paper presents stylised facts about the business cycle of the euro area. The results suggest that the stylised facts for the euro area economy and the US are very similar. The magnitude of the fluctuations in consumption, investment, prices, inflation, interest rate, monetary aggregates...

This paper investigates the importance of labor market institutions for inflation and unemployment dynamics. Using the New Keynesian framework we argue that labor market institutions should be divided into those institutions that cause Unemployment Rigidities (UR) and those that cause Real Wage...

Using bilateral data on international equity and bond flows, we find that the prediction of the International Capital Asset Pricing Model is partially met and that global equity markets might be more integrated than global bond markets. Moreover, over the turbulent 1998-2001 period characterised...