Recent institutional changes in the European Union have strengthened the original Stability and Growth Pact by negotiating the Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union ("fiscal compact"). The cyclically-adjusted budget balance is the main quantitative...

In this paper we present a new long-term database on monthly export and import series for 23 economies during 1921-2010 and its first empirical application. Using these data, we analyse the synchronised decline in foreign trade during the recession 2008-09 in a historical perspective. We...

This paper analyses the change in the Austrian business cycle over time using data back to 1954. The change in the cyclical pattern is captured using a nonlinear univariate structural time series model where the time of the break point is estimated. Results for GDP series suggest a break in the...