Ivan Gasparovic, the controversial former president of parliament, has won the presidential election in Slovakia. In the final runoff ballot on 17 April 2004, he defeated his former political associate and former prime minister, Vladimir Meciar. Both of these politicians had been largely...

The volatility of general government tax revenues has increased in Poland in recent years. The correlation between GDP growth and revenue growth appears to be lower in Poland than in many other EU Member States, which suggests that the instability of its revenues has a different. This Country...

National fiscal frameworks can complement the EU budgetary surveillance procedure. Poland has traditionally had a debt rule, but it did not discourage governments from running high deficits. High expenditure (mainly on social benefits) has been identified as one of the main sources of large...

This study provides a background for the preparation of the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines (BEPG) 2003 and assists the EP in putting forward recommendations in supply-side issues covered in the BEPGs. The report looks at investment, progress in opening markets, integration of financial...

The European Network of Economic Policy Research Institutes (ENEPRI) brings together twenty-four leading national economic policy research institutes from most of the EU-27 countries. The goals of the network are to foster the international diffusion of existing research, co-ordinate research...

Back in the 1960s the EU accepted the idea of Turkish membership in a fit of absent-mindedness, not as part of a coherent strategy. EU leaders and their voters are mostly unenthusiastic about the idea of Turkey joining the EU, and many prominent politicians openly oppose it. Yet the EU has made...

The economic gap between the EU and three candidate countries - Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey - is significant. Living standards, as measured by GDP per capita at PPP, are less than one third of the level prevailing in the former EU-15 u0096 and about half of the average level in the new member...