With twelve new members the decision making in the European Union via intergovernmental cooperation will become ineffective. In order to avoid a Stagno-Europe the EU has a choice: Either it looks for the very essentials in the common institutional frame or the member states agree in ceding...

The paper looks at the global environment as a public good and as a sink for CO2-emissions. It discusses problems to be solved in institutional arrangements to protect global environmental media and looks at criteria for allocating the costs of emission reduction and emission rights. It analyzes...

A Transatlantic Free Trade Area (TAFTA) has been proposed in the mid-1990s to revitalize the economic and political ties between the United States and the European Union. This paper discusses the expected economic gains from such a free trade area for its members with respect to trade in goods...

Der Stabilitätspakt hat die Aufgabe, der nationalen Finanzpolitik bei der Verschuldung die Hände zu binden und damit den Euro als vergemeinschaftete Währung abzusichern. Denn ob Geld stabil ist, hängt auch davon ab, wie solide die Staatsfinanzen sind. Den Pakt aufzuweichen wird später einen...

This paper discusses the goal conflict between social protection and economic growth as well as employment. Taking the German economy as an example for the large continental economies of Old Europe, it analyzes twenty mechanisms that affect the fundamentals of the economy negatively and imply...

Europe’s labor is not competitiveness taking unemployment as the relevant indicator. The paper looks at other indicators such as job creation, productivity and unit labor costs and skills. It analyzes the reasons for the lack of competitiveness including a low degree of wage differentiation,...