In this paper we question the consensus of using a binary crisis definition for empirical crisis models. We believe that the most severe shortcomings of the crisis models today are in the crisis definition rather than the explanatory variables. We present a crisis model that is specified for a...

This paper constructs new business cycle indices for Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico based on common dynamic factors extracted from a comprehensive set of sectoral output, external data, and fiscal and financial variables spanning over a century. The constructed indices are used to derive a...

Proposed alternatives to GDP as a measure of social welfare or human progress are briefly evaluated. Four main categories are considered, namely ISEW and GPI based on corrections of GDP, sustainable or green(ed) GDP, genuine savings/investments and composite indexes. All these alternatives turn...

In this paper we present and describe the revised version of the KOF Globalisation Index, a composite index measuring globalisation for every country in the world along the economic, social and political dimension. The original index was introduced by Dreher (2006) and updated in Dreher et al....

We present a new aggregation method - called SVM algorithm - and use this technique to produce novel measures of democracy (186 countries, 1960-2014). The method takes its name from a machine learning technique for pattern recognition and has three notable features: it makes functional...