We compute public sector performance (PSP) and efficiency (PSE) indicators, comprising a composite and seven sub-indicators, for 23 industrialised countries. The first four sub-indicators are u0093opportunityu0094 indicators that take into account administrative, education and health outcomes...

The report concentrates on two major challenges facing municipalities in the central and eastern European countries: how to meet the strict requirements of EU accession, and how to deal with the rising waste burden.The report was prepared within the framework of the European Commission LOGON II...

Within a two-step GARCH framework we explore the linkages between equity returns of ten sectors in the euro area, the United States and Japan, respectively. Our estimation framework allows a distinction to be made between spillover effects originating from one of the three currency areas and...

There has been much discussion of the differences in macroeconomic performance and prospects between the US, Japan and the euro area. Using Markov-switching techniques, in this paper we identify and compare specifically their major business-cycle features and examine the case for a common...

This paper offers an alternative explanation for the behavior of postwar US inflation by measuring a novel source of monetary policy time-inconsistency due to Cukierman (2002). In the presence of asymmetric preferences, the monetary authorities end up generating a systematic inflation bias...

A number of authors have attemted to test whether the U.S. economy is in a determinate or an indeterminate equilibrium. We argue that to answer this question, one must be impose a priori restrictions on lag length that cannot be tested. We provide examples of two economic models. Model 1...

We revisit recent evidence on how monetary policy affects output and prices in the U.S. and in the euro area. The response patterns to a shift in monetary policy are similar in most respects, but differ noticeably as to the composition of output changes. In the euro area investment is the...