The 2008-09 crisis has shown that some euro area member countries were unable to sufficiently stabilize their economies which has given rise to a debate about deeper fiscal integration in Europe. In this paper, we analyze the redistributive and stabilizing effects of two scenarios of fiscal...

Whether observed differences in redistributive policies across countries are the result of differences in social preferences or efficiency constraints is an important question that paves the debate about the optimality of welfare regimes. To shed new light on this question, we estimate labor...

Following the report of the Stiglitz Commission, measuring and comparing well-being across countries has gained renewed interest. Yet, analyses that go beyond income and incorporate non-market dimensions of welfare most often rely on the assumption of identical preferences to avoid the...

The current debt crisis has given rise to a debate about deeper fiscal integration in Europe. The view is widespread that moving towards a ‘fiscal union’ would have a stabilising effect in the event of macroeconomic shocks. In this paper we study the economic effects of introducing...

We analyze to which extent social inequality aversion differs across nations when control- ling for actual country differences in labor supply responses. Towards this aim, we estimate labor supply elasticities at both extensive and intensive margins for 17 EU countries and the US. Using the same...

Whether observed differences in redistributive policies across countries are the result of differences in social preferences or efficiency constraints is an important question that paves the debate about the optimality of welfare regimes. To shed new light on this question, we estimate labor...

We analyze different options for the design of a common unemployment insurance system for the euro area (EA). We assess their effectiveness to act as an insurance device in the presence of asymmetric macroeconomic shocks. Running counterfactual simulations based on micro data for the period...

The 2008-09 crisis has shown that some euro area member countries were unable to sufficiently stabilize their economies which has given rise to a debate about deeper fiscal integration in Europe. In this paper, we analyze the redistributive and stabilizing effects of two scenarios of fiscal...

We assess the effects of U.S. tax policy reforms on inequality by applying a new decomposition method allowing us to disentangle the policy effect from changing market incomes. Over the period 1979-2007, the cumulative policy effect aggravated inequality by increasing the income share of the top...

The 2008-09 crisis has shown that some euro area member countries were unable to sufficiently stabilize their economies which has given rise to a debate about deeper fiscal integration in Europe. In this paper, we analyze the redistributive and stabilizing effects of two scenarios of fiscal...