We set up a simple overlapping generation model that allows us to distinguish between life expectancy and active life expectancy. We show that individuals optimally adjust to a longer active life by educating more and, if the labor supply elasticity is high enough, by supplying less labor. When...

From its early post-war catch-up phase, Germany's formidable export engine has been its consistent driver of growth. But Germany has almost equally consistently run current account surpluses. Exports have powered the dynamic phases and helped emerge from stagnation. Volatile external demand, in...

This paper estimates the effects of tax changes on the U.K. economy. Identification is achieved by isolating the 'exogenous' tax policy shocks in the post-war U.K. economy using a narrative strategy as in Romer and Romer (2010). The resulting tax changes are shown to be unforecastable on the...

Russland treffen die Auswirkungen der internationalen Finanzkrise und fallender Energiepreise zu einem ungünstigen Zeitpunkt: In den kommenden zwei Jahren muss Russland internationale Kredite in erheblicher Höhe bedienen. Aktuell zeigt sich eine deutliche Abnahme der Währungsreserven sowie...

We review evidence on the Great Moderation together with evidence about volatility trends at the micro level to develop a potential explanation for the decline in aggregate volatility since the 1980s and its consequences. The key elements are declines in firm-level volatility and aggregate...

This paper examines empirically the interaction between immigration and host country economic conditions. We employ panel VAR techniques to use a large annual dataset on 22 OECD countries over the period 1987-2009. The VAR approach allows to addresses the endogeneity problem by allowing the...

The Lisbon strategy could reinvigorate Europeu0092s economy and boost employment. In 2000 the European leaders agreed to stimulate economic growth and employment and make Europeu0092s economy the most competitive in the world. If Europe would really reach the goals they set, Europeu0092s Gross...

The author examines the impact of incomplete risk-sharing on growth and welfare. The source of market incompleteness in the economy is private information: a household's idiosyncratic productivity shock is not observable by others. Risk-sharing between households occurs through long-term...

Recent empirical evidence shows that gross official capital transactions flow upstream in the international financial markets due to government policy objectives and that they account for the current account surpluses observed in the last decade in the fast-growing emerging economies. Following...

Since the early 1990s income inequality has regained a central role in the current theoretical, applied and policy debate dominating the scene in the developed, developing and transition countries. In developed countries the diminishing labour share has become one of the main concern of...