Using unit labor cost (ULC) data from Euro area countries as well as US States and German La͏̈nder we investigate inflation convergence using different approaches, namely panel unit root tests, cointegration tests and error-correction models. All in all we cannot reject convergence of ULC...

Using unit labor cost (ULC) data from Euro area countries as well as US States and German Länder we investigate inflation convergence using different approaches, namely panel unit root tests, cointegration tests and error-correction models. All in all we cannot reject convergence of ULC growth...

This paper compares relative unit labour cost developments in the countries of the euro-area since the beginning of the European Monetary Union (EMU) both with historical developments and with intra-regional unit labour cost developments in the United States of America and Germany. To this end,...

Inflation differentials in the Euro area are mainly due to a sustained divergence of wage developments across the Euro area, and narrower differences in labour productivity growth (Alvarez et al., 2006). We investigate convergence of inflation using unit labour cost (ULC) growth and applying...

Based on a panel of German professional forecasts for 1970 to 2002 we find that growth and inflation forecasts are unbiased and weakly, but not strongly efficient. Besides the effect of diverging forecasting dates, no other substantial differences in forecasting quality are found among...

Main description: Seit geraumer Zeit gibt es eine lebhafte Diskussion über die Wirksamkeit von Strukturanpassungs- und Stabilisierungsprogrammen des Internationalen Währungsfonds in Entwicklungsländern. Die dabei vertretene Position des "Washington Consensus" setzt auf Stabilisierung,...