The paper discusses similarities and differences between NDC and the French and German point systems. The study focuses on how these systems differ when there is an external shock (demographic, economic, or other) and discusses the possible consequences of moving from the point system to NDC....

This paper assesses the impact on growth and the inter-generational redistributive effects of some possible pension reforms in France using a dynamic general equilibrium model with overlapping generations. Results suggest that a reform increasing the effective average retirement age by 1.25...

We analyse the economic impact of a simultaneous aging shock in two countries. The countries are identical in all respects except the financing scheme of their public pension system. While one relies on capitalization, the other one relies on a pay-as-you-go scheme. We show that the two...

The surge in the German house prices starting in 2010 raised fears about the emergence of a speculative bubble. Given a local nature of housing markets, it is not clear to what extent the bubble, if any, is spread across different cities. In this paper, we test for speculative house price...

In an uncertain world, decisions by market participants are based on expectations. Thus, sentiment indicators reflecting expectations are proven at predicting economic variables. However, survey respondents largely perceive the world through media reports. Typically, crude media information,...

Before the World War I, the urban rental housing market in Germany could be described as a free and competitive market. The government hardly interfered in the relationships between the landlords and ten- ants. The rents were set freely. During the World War I, the market was hit by several...

This study utilizes the dynamic factor model of Giannone et al. (2008) in order to make now-/forecasts of GDP quarter-on-quarter growth rates in Switzerland. It also assesses the informational content of macroeconomic data releases for forecasting of the Swiss GDP. We find that the factor model...

German business cycle forecasts refer to the whole country. However, the usefulness of these forecasts at the regional level is not uncontroversial. Significant deviations between regional and national forecasts could occur if the sectoral structure is different. In this case, the forecast for...

The paper evaluates the quality of the German national accounting data (GDP and its use-side components) as measured by the magnitude and dispersion of the forecast/ revision errors. It is demonstrated that government consumption series are the least reliable, whereas real GDP and real private...