Recent empirical and theoretical literature on the impact of real exchange rate devaluations on economic performance questions the traditional expansionary effect generated within standard Mundell-Fleming models. Contractionary devaluations may arise when firms face maturity or currency...

Flexible labor markets require geographically mobile workers to be efficient. Otherwise, firms can take advantage of the immobility of workers and extract monopsony rents. In cultures with strong family ties, moving away from home is costly. Thus, individuals with strong family ties rationally...

This essay reviews the relationship between natural-resource abundance and economic growth around the world, and presents some new results. The principal reasons why resource-based production can inhibit economic growth over long periods are traced to the Dutch disease, neglect of education,...

Purpose - In a meta-study, we have bridged the gap between the pros and cons of a questionable finance-growth nexus. Design/methodology/approach - Over 20 fundamental characteristics that have influenced the debate over the last decades have been examined. The empirical evidence is based on 196...

Purpose - In a meta-study on the finance-growth nexus, we have bridged the gap between Schumpeterian authors and sympathizers of a questionable finance-growth nexus. Design/methodology/approach - Over 20 fundamental characteristics that have influenced the debate over the last decades have been...

This paper provides a stylized model of the workings of a global economy where one of its key driving factors is economic agents' continuous struggle to find assets in which to park financial resources. This struggle naturally comes with euphoria and disappointments, as many of the "parking...

This paper extends the Dincer and Eichengreen (2007) index of central bank transparency. Improvements in transparency are notable in Central and Eastern Europe, while the index has shown much smaller rises in most other parts of the world. The pattern observed by Dincer and Eichengreen,...

The examination of U.S. crises reveals that the current financial crisis follows past patterns. An investment bubble creates excess demand for new financing instruments. During the railroad bubbles of the nineteenth century loans were issued at a pace higher than many companies could pay back....

In this paper, we assess the impact of fiscal policy discretion on economic activity in the short and medium-term. Using a panel of 132 countries from 1960 to 2008, we find that fiscal policy discretion provides a net stimulus to the economy in the short-run and crowding-in effects are amplified...

Orthodox and heterodox theories of financial crises are hereby compared from a theoretical viewpoint, with emphasis on their genesis. The former view (represented by the fourth generation models of Paul Krugman) reflects the neoclassical vision whereby turbulence is an exception; the latter...