Over the last decade many of the Western welfare states have found themselves under pressure to reform due to both exogenous factors, such as globalisation and the aging of society, and endogenous factors, such as a shift in focus from welfare to workfare. An important aspect of these reforms...

Since the foundation of the Dutch welfare state in the nineteenth century, the distinction between government and market has been object of discussion. In the first welfare arrangements, the role of the government was subsidiary to that of private initiatives. The churches looked after the poor...

Banks perform similar functions all over the world. Nevertheless, the banking systems around the world are very different. This paper analyses how the difference affects local firms as well as small and medium-sized enterprises. For my project, I combine banking and economic data of five EU...