The aim of this paper is to assess the ability of social spending to smooth output shocks and to provide stabilization. The results show that overall social spending is able to smooth about 16 percent of a shock to GDP. Among its subcategories, social spending devoted to Old Age and Unemployment...

There is widespread evidence that a better access to markets contributes to raising income levels. However, no quantification of the impact of distance to markets has been made on the basis of a sample restricted to advanced — and therefore more homogeneous — countries. This paper applies...

This paper describes the OECD’s new small global forecasting model for the three main OECD economic regions: the United States, the euro area, and Japan. The key variables – which include output, inflation, the trade balance, and import prices – are driven by monetary and fiscal policy,...

Central banks have responded with exceptional vigour to the crisis by using their traditional interest-rate tools to their limits and deploying a wide range of unconventional measures. This paper documents these responses in a systematic way, reviews the evidence about their impact, and...

Against a background of mounting demands for spending on services provided by sub-central governments, this paper examines how fiscal rules can help to ensure that pressure on resources is minimised and available resources are used efficiently. Drawing on questionnaire responses and other...

This paper assesses recent patterns in intergenerational social mobility across OECD countries and examines the role that public policies can play in affecting such mobility. It shows that the relationship between parental or socio-economic background and offspring’s educational and wage...

This paper breaks new ground by providing comparable estimates of intergenerational wage and education persistence across 14 European OECD countries based on a new micro data from Eurostat. A further novelty is that it examines the potential role of public policies and labour and product market...

The recent period of sustained high growth in the United States has drawn attention to its financial system and the efficiency with which it seems to be able to channel funds to new productive investment projects, particularly in hi-tech industries. This study examines the role played by the...

This paper assesses the potential to raise public spending efficiency in the primary and secondary education sector. Resource availability per pupil has increased significantly over the past decade in a number of countries; often in attempting to exploit the link between educational attainment...

Over the past 25 years inflation has moderated considerably in all OECD economies. At the same time, the production of many goods and services has become increasingly internationalised and the level of trade between the OECD and non-OECD economies has risen markedly. This paper investigates the...