This paper examines the macroeconomic performance of the Irish economy in the years leading up to the Celtic Tiger and afterward, from 1980 to 2011. The goal of the paper is to determine how a severe recession in the 1980s could be followed so quickly by the unprecedented boom years of the...

We analyze the implications of changes in the trend growth rate for optimal monetary policy in the presence of search and matching unemployment. We show that trend growth in itself does not generate a trade-off for the monetary authority, but that it interacts importantly with the inefficiencies...

Economic policy in the EU faces a trilemma of solving three challenges simultaneously - growth, distribution, and the environment. In order to assess policies that address these issues simultaneously, economic models need to account for both sector-sector and sector-environment feedbacks within...

In this paper we review the empirical and theoretical literature on the effects of changes in the relationship between the financial sector and the non-financial sectors of the economy associated with 'financialisation' on distribution, growth, instability and crises. We take a macroeconomic...

Unprecedented demographic changes are set to unfold in most of the industrialized world. They are relevant not only because of the diminishing pool of workers, but also because of the increasing importance of retirees as an economic class. Retirees' consumption and saving patterns can differ...

Once again, the EMU faces an economic crisis, this time caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. To avoid the mistakes of the insufficient response to the global financial crisis, it is vital that this time the focus will turn on achieving fast, sustainable recovery, instead of contractionary measures...