The impact of the creation of a monetary union on structural convergence among member countries remains an open question. A model of monetary union is presented in which national nominal wage flexibility is endogenous and may vary across countries. We use wage indexation as a proxy for nominal...

What lessons can be drawn from the European experience with regional integration that started in the 1950s, for regional integration in Latin America, which is still in its early stages? We present here a new indicator of institutional integration and study how it developed vis-à-vis diverse...

We employ the econometric techniques of multivariate cointegration and error-correction models to investigate the impact of the creation of the European Monetary System (EMS) on the volume of intra-European Union (EU) exports for eight EU countries. We find that for Ireland the EMS boosted the...

This paper examines whether or not the Northeast Asian economies, namely, China, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan, can form a currency union, where a single currency and a uniform monetary policy are adopted, or an exchange rate union where all the currencies are pegged to an internal or external...

This paper investigates empirically the extent to which the ten new EU countries are ready to join the European Monetary Union (EMU). Using France and Germany as a benchmark, we assess the prospects of successful EMU participation based on common trends analysis of the nominal convergence...

This paper presents a two-country two-industry monetary model, with intermediate inputs and transport costs, which builds a bridge between the New Open Economy Macroeconomics and the New Economic Geography literatures. Endogenously asymmetric shocks arise in this model when the exchange rate...

Since the signing of the Maastricht Treaty, there has been an intensive discussion whether the convergence criteria incorporated into the contract were appropriate to prepare the EU-member-countries for European Monetary Union. We argue that at least inflationary convergence was not a necessary...

Eastward enlargement of the Eurozone will result in transition economies sharing a currency with well-established market economies. We compare the suitability of the candidates relative to current members at a similar time before joining, as well as their readiness to comply with Maastricht...

This paper assesses the prospects for monetary integration between Emerging East Asian (EEA) economies. We develop a simple analytical framework for currency unions of small open economies. The empirical analysis looks at a number of supply-side characteristics of EEA countries highlighted by...

The analysis deals with the conditions under which coordination is attractive to a country in the flexible exchange-rate system. In particular, great weight is attached to the design of a common policy-decision council. The starting point is the Barro- Gordon approach, which is extended to...