Do asset prices affect real activity? This question has taken on a new importance in recent years, as asset values first surged at the end of 1990s and, thereafter, dramatically retreated. This report reviews the available theoretical and empirical evidence regarding asset price and wealth...

The US-centred debate on the decoupling of productivity from workers' compensation has given rise to the question whether this decoupling has also taken place in other countries, and if so, to what degree. However, in-depth analyses of the extent and the underlying causes of wage-productivity...

Inflation affects the purchasing power of households. This paper documents large, idiosyncratic inflation differences between households in their everyday shopping. Low-income households have experienced higher inflation in the last ten years, but the difference for richer households has been...

In mid-September 2008, a global financial crisis erupted which was followed by the most serious worldwide economic recession for decades. As in many other regions of the world, governments in the euro area stepped in with a wide range of emergency measures to stabilise the financial sector and...

This paper provides a critical analysis of the possible methods, data sources and the existing results of the field of 'the economic costs of mass violent conflict' by identifying strengths and weaknesses of the existing literature. The report evaluates content, methods, and data sources of the...

Unit labour costs (ULCs) are one of the key economic variables considered in the context of globalization, competitiveness and production-location decisions. With the EU accession of eight Central and East European countries and their (almost) full inclusion in the European Single Market, the...

This study presents a concise analysis of the macroeconomic developments in four cohesion countries (CCs) Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain, from 1960 to 2000. Special attention is being paid to the economic performance of these countries after their accession to the European Union (EU). The...

Countries belonging to the European neighbourhood are highly diverse. Their diversity is multidimensional (geographical, socio-economic, political, cultural, religious, etc.) and the individual dimensions all have important implications for EU policies towards the region(s), for EU institutional...

In der ökonomischen Forschung fehlt bislang gesamtwirtschaftlich repräsentative empirische Evidenz zu der Frage, ob offene Stellen als Vorlaufindikator für die Beschäftigungsentwicklung gelten können. Bei der Interpretation der aktuellen Entwicklung des Stellenangebots wird dies häufig...

Die Corona-Pandemie hat infolge der gesundheitspolitischen Maßnahmen und der vielfältigen Auswirkungen auf die Angebots- und Nachfrageseite der rund um den Globus betroffenen Volkswirtschaften das weltweite Wirtschaftsleben im zweiten Quartal 2020 so stark beeinträchtigt, wie kein Ereignis...