This paper studies how gradualism affects the welfare gains from trade, technology, and reforms. When people face adjustment frictions, gradual shocks create less adverse distributional effects in the short run. We show that there are welfare gains from inducing a more gradual transition via...

Institutional improvement can be a very slow and uncertain process when institutional quality is weak. In the meantime, countries have launched far-reaching economic reforms whose success is predicated on a large investment response. However, the uncertainties attending institutional reform can...

Will EMU accelerate or retard structural reform in labour and product markets? The theoretical literature is ambiguous. New descriptive evidence provided in this paper suggests that euro-area countries have made relatively good progress in structural reform. However, it is much less clear...

The year 2003 has witnessed several major reform policy initiatives in Germany intended to contribute to a solution to Germany's high unemployment problem and to improve the longrun sustainability of its social welfare policies. These economic reforms are discussed within a larger macroeconomic...

Das Gutachten analysiert Konzept und erste Ergebnisse der neuen Wirtschaftspolitik unter Mazowiecki. Es folgen die Bilanz der schon eingeleiteten westlichen Wirtschaftshilfe und die Möglichkeiten und Rahmenbedingungen einer weiteren Unterstützung.

Die griechischen Wahlen haben den Blick wieder auf die Südländer der Europäischen Währungsunion gelenkt. Wenn verkrustete Strukturen wichtige Krisenursachen waren, muss die Therapie dort ansetzen. Der Autor gibt einen Überblick über die Reformen in den Südländern in Hinblick auf...

Following a severe contraction in the early 1990s, the Swedish economy accumulated a strong record of output growth coupled with a disappointing performance in the labor market. As of 2005, hours worked per person 20-64 years of age are 10.5 percent below the 1990 peak and a mere one percent...

Following a severe contraction in the early 1990s, the Swedish economy accumulated a strong record of output growth coupled with a disappointing performance in the labor market. As of 2005, hours worked per person 20-64 years of age are 10.5 percent below the 1990 peak and a mere one percent...

Following a severe contraction in the early 1990s, the Swedish economy accumulated a strong record of output growth coupled with a disappointing performance in the labor market. As of 2005, hours worked per person 20-64 years of age are 10.5 percent below the 1990 peak and a mere one percent...

We document a change in the character and quality of Turkish economic growth with a turning point around 2007 and link this change to the reversal in the nature of economic institutions, which eat underwent a series of growth-enhancing reforms following Turkey's financial crisis in 2001, but...