In 2004, the Australian Government asked the Productivity Commission to look at the impact on the economy and the community of NCP and related reforms and for areas which offer opportunities for significant gains. The Commission found that the benefits of NCP have greatly outweighed the costs....

The Productivity Commission’s inquiry report into the ‘Review of the National Competition Policy Reforms’ was released in April 2005. In 2004 the Australian Government asked the Productivity Commission to look at the impact on the economy and the community of NCP and related reforms and...

The Productivity Commission’s inquiry report into the ‘Conservation of Australia’s Historic Heritage Places’, was tabled in Parliament on 21 July 2006. The Commission was asked to examine the policy framework and incentives for the conservation of Australia’s historic built heritage...

This paper analyzes rules for international factor movements, i.e. real capital flows together with the relocation of firms, the flow of technology and the migration of people. These rules have to make sure that individuals, individual countries as well as the world economy benefit from factor...

Aggregate labor productivity is a central indicator of an economy's economic development and a wellspring of living standards. Somewhat controversially, many macroeconomists see productivity as a primary driver of fluctuations in economic activity along the business cycle. In some countries, the...

A new, capitalism-denying book is on the shelves, and it makes a stunning discovery: ‘Capitalism without competition is not capitalism’! Capitalist crisis, like climate change, tends to breed ‘capitalism deniers’. The problem, argue the deniers, lies not in capitalism but in its...

We estimate the effect of political regime transitions on growth with semi-parametric methods, combining difference in differences with matching, that have not been used in macroeconomic settings. Our semi-parametric estimates suggest that previous parametric estimates may have seriously...

This paper discusses the goal conflict between social protection and economic growth as well as employment. Taking the German economy as an example for the large continental economies of Old Europe, it analyzes twenty mechanisms that affect the fundamentals of the economy negatively and imply...

As governments and corporations have intensified their efforts to locate, extract, and capitalise oil, gas, and various other biophysical materials, the world has simultaneously witnessed a proliferation of social resistance to these efforts. While taking many forms, such resistance, and...

The article proposes a social network analysis of the main European capitalisms and its correspondence with an index of economic freedom. The analysis relates to two kinds of economic liberties taken from the concept of freedom formulated by Isaiah Berlin. While the first kind of freedom...