This paper analyses the effects of the recent euro area economic, financial and debt crisis on SMEs’ access to bank finance. We use a survey on access to finance of SMEs in the euro area carried out by the European Central Bank during 2009 and 2010 to examine the impact of macroeconomic...

The Prudential Capital Assessment Review (PCAR) 2011 uncovered significant potential losses in the Irish banking sector, leading to a considerable recapitalisation. This letter uses a large sample of the loan level data provided for PCAR 2011 to present descriptive statistics on the SME lending...

While growth in output and employment remains relatively strong in the Irish economy, there has been considerable focus recently on some high-profile job losses, particularly in the manufacturing sector. This paper places these developments within a broader context and shows that aggregate...

One of the most robust empirical results in international economics is the existence of a negative relationship between trade flows and distance. More recent research on exporting activity at the firm level has established an apparently equally robust result---few firms export, and exporting...

This paper presents an extension of the analysis of the geographic dimension of trade, by examining the trading patterns of individual firms. Aggregate data does not tell us if a sector is geographically diversified because there are many exporting firms, each of which specialises in a separate...

The negative relationship between host-country tax rates and FDI has been tested in a large number of papers. This paper looks at a different channel through which tax systems could affect FDI, namely the complexity of the tax system. Complying with tax authority requirements can be extremely...

The extension of credit to SMEs in Ireland has been identified as a necessary condition for economic recovery and job growth. The debate on whether the reduction in credit to this sector is caused by credit rationing by banks or a lack of credit demand on the part of SMEs has received much...

This paper investigates the wage-setting behaviour of Irish firms. We place particular emphasis on the use of flexible pay components and examine how these allow firms to deal with shocks requiring a reduction in costs without having to cut base wages. The results presented in this paper are...

Small firms have often been identified as drivers of job creation, although the evidence on their contribution to net employment growth has been disputed. This paper shows that job turnover and firm growth vary systematically across firm size groups and that smaller firms do indeed make an...

The rarity with which firms reduce nominal wages has been frequently observed, even in the face of considerable negative economic shocks. This paper uses a unique survey of fourteen European countries to ask firms directly about the incidence of wage cuts and to assess the relevance of a range...