Towards the end of 2009, the world economy was recovering from its deepest recession since the end of World War II. Most countries around the world took resort to fiscal policy in order to foster this recovery. In this paper, we first discuss the pros and cons of discretionary fiscal policy from...

Characteristics of recessions -- The recession of 1948-49 -- The recession of 1953-54 -- The recession of 1957-58 -- The recession of 1960-61 -- The recession of 1969-70 -- The recession of 1973-75 -- The recession of 1980 -- The recession of 1981-82 -- The recession of 1990-91 -- The recession...

"The Future of Capitalism After the Financial Crisis: The Varieties of Capitalism Debate in the Age of Austerity contains thirteen world leading political economists writing from within eight different countries who critically analyze the current crisis tendencies of capitalism both globally and...

In this paper we assess the information content of seven widely cited early indicators for the euro area with respect to forecasting area-wide industrial production. To this end, we use various tests that are designed to compare competing forecast models. In addition to the standard...