Health-care systems play a crucial role in supporting human health. They also have major macroeconomic implications, an aspect that is not always properly acknowledged. Countries spend very different amounts on healthcare, with spending in North America (Canada and the United States) more than...

Excess liquidity (defined as all kinds of commercial bank deposits held by the Eurosystem minus the minimum reserve requirements) in the euro area exceeded €1,900 billion, or 17 percent of euro-area GDP, in September 2018. Holding such excess liquidity is costly for commercial banks, given...