It is widely argued that Europe's unified monetary policy calls for the international coordination at the fiscal level. We survey the issues involved with such coordination of fiscal policy as a demand management tool and we use a simple model to investigate the circumstances under which...

We explore the implications of monetary unification for real interest rates and (relative) public debt levels. The adoption of a common monetary policy renders the risk-return characteristics of the participating countries more similar, so that the substitutability of their public debt increases...

This paper discusses mandatory participation in Dutch occupational pension schemes. While mandatory participation is a historical feature of most second-pillar pension arrangements, some recent developments may affect the case for mandatory participation. The main ones are the revision of the...

For a sample of sixteen OECD countries over the period 1980-2007 we show that, for given debt-GDP ratio, an increase in the maturity of the public debt by one year lowers its long-term interest rate by around 20-30 basis points. This effect is stronger for countries with higher average inflation...

There is substantial consensus in the literature that positive uncertainty shocks predict a slowdown of economic activity. However, using U.S. data since 1950 we show that the macroeconomic response pattern to stock market volatility shocks has changed substantially over time. The negative...

This paper explores the introduction of collective risk-sharing elements in defined contri-bution pension contracts. We consider status-contingent, age-contingent and asset contingent risk-sharing arrangements. All arrangements raise aggregate welfare, as measured by equiva- lent variations....

On 19 June 2010 the Chinese authorities announced that the renminbi (RMB) was henceforth to be pegged to a currency basket. Yet, it has quite closely followed the USD, though having appreciated by 2.7 % by the time of writing. At the G20 Seoul Summit on 11-12 November 2010, China committed to...

The paper examines the effects of ageing and makes a case for partial pre-funding of pensions. The argument is based on inter-generational fairness in a situation where pension expenditure as compared to wages increases due to low fertility and increasing longevity. We illustrate the approach by...