This paper places Anglo-German growth after World War II in a long-term comparative perspective. Reviewing explanations of why post-war Germany is more dynamic than Britain, we evaluate arguments stressing institutional change, catching-up, and country-specific long-term experience. Examining...

We evaluate explanations for why Germany grew so quickly in the 1950s. The recent literature has emphasized convergence, structural change and institutional shake-up while minimizing the importance of the postwar shock. We show that this shock and its consequences were more important than...

We evaluate explanations for why Germany grew so quickly in the 1950s. The recent literature has emphasized convergence, structural change and institutional shake-up while minimizing the importance of the postwar shock. We show that this shock and its consequences were more important than...

Using newly assembled data on foreign exchange market intervention, we construct a daily index of exchange market pressure during the 1992-3 crisis in the European Monetary System. Using this index, we pinpoint when and where the crisis was most severe. Our analysis focuses on a neglected factor...

We examine the impact of the Great Depression on the share of votes for right-wing anti-system parties in elections in the 1920s and 1930s. We confirm the existence of a link between political extremism and economic hard times as captured by growth or contraction of the economy. What mattered...

The thesis of this paper is that there is no historical precedent for Europe's monetary union (EMU). While it is possible to point to similar historical experiences, the most obvious of which were in the 19th century, occurred in Europe, and had "union" as part of their names, EMU differs from...

We evaluate explanations for why Germany grew so quickly in the 1950s. The recent literature has emphasized convergence, structural change and institutional shake-up while minimizing the importance of the postwar shock. We show that this shock and its consequences were more important than...

This paper is a first attempt to evaluate the economic effects of the Marshall Plan. We find that US aid had a significant impact on Europe's recovery from World War II. The recipients of large amounts of Marshall aid recovered significantly faster than other industrial countries. Strikingly,...

In the aftermath of World War II, Italy and France experienced high inflation. The two countries enacted remarkably similar economic policy measures, but stabilization came at different times: for Italy at the end of 1947, and for France a year later. Traditional explanations for the restoration...

We evaluate explanations for why Germany grew so quickly in the 1950s. The recent litera- ture has emphasized convergence, structural change and institutional shake-up while minimiz- ing the importance of the postwar shock. We show that this shock and its consequences were more important than...