Tiny changes in the American monetary policy can have dramatic effects on the rest of the world because of dollar's double role of national and international currency. This is the Triffin dilemma. The paper shows how it works through three examples: price of commodities, dollarization, and the...

This paper compares the depth of the recent crisis and the Great Depression. We use a new data set to compare the drop in activity in the industrialized countries for seven activity indicators. This is done under the assumption that the recent crisis leveled off in mid-2009 for production and...

Today it's frequently used the terms PIGS or PIIGS, acronyms used by economic journalists to refer to different countries of the European Union for their statement of affairs. The bad connotation is evident from the fact that pigs in English suggest the bad state of the economies of these...

The size of the public debt is now one of the main areas of interest of the entire society. As the size of the debt increases with time, one should consider possible ways of reducing it. Decision makers focus both on ways to reduce the increase in public debt and on ways to reduce its size....

This research paper presents four alternative experimental models for monitoring economic failures. These models include the national production function (NP-Function), the multi-level trade creation and trade diversion analytical framework, the mega-economic structures vulnerability analysis...

The Spanish debt consolidation between 1996 and 2007 represents, by its size and duration, an impressive case among the European Union countries. This paper aims at characterizing the Spanish debt consolidation process in order to assess its effects on economic inequality and welfare. For that...

Vor 25 Jahren wurde in der DDR die D-Mark eingeführt. Die Währungsunion erwies sich mit Blick auf die Wirtschaftsentwicklung als ein Desaster. Kurzfristig wurden die wenig produktiven Betriebe der DDR dem freien Handel ausgesetzt; die Industrieproduktion brach in einem Maße zusammen, das...

While there is a fairly broad consensus regarding the potential adverse effects of generous unemployment benefit insurance on steady-state employment, the short-term effects of benefit reforms are not well-established. This paper contributes to fill this gap by estimating impulse responses to...

This paper investigates the short run as well the long run relationships between money supply, inflation, government expenditure and economic growth by employing the Error Correction Mechanism (ECM) and Johansen co-integration test respectively for the case of Cyprus using annual data from 1980...

The current state of affairs in the euro area (EA) instills hope in economic recovery but also substantial concern. The crisis countries have made considerable, albeit quite uneven, progress in central areas of reform. Yet severe obstacles remain. Moreover, European policy makers have reformed...