This paper uses a VAR to investigate four possible explanations of the extended slump in Japanese economic activity over the 1990s: the absence of bold and consistent fiscal stimulus; the limited room for expansionary monetary policy due to a liquidity trap; overinvestment and debt overhang; and...

Recent years have seen a wave of empirical studies attempting to give empirical content to the theory of optimum currency areas as a way of marshalling evidence on the costs and benefits of EMU. This paper reviews this empirical literature, as a way of examining the success with which theory has...

Using a general-equilibrium simulation model featuring nominal rigidities and monopolistic competition in product and labour markets, this Paper estimates the macroeconomic benefits and international spillovers of an increase in competition. After calibrating the model to the euro area vs. the...

This paper examines some popular explanations for the smooth operation of the pre-1914 gold standard. We find that the rapid adjustment of economies to underlying disturbances played an important role in stabilizing output and employment under the gold standard system, but no evidence that this...

Extending recent theoretical contributions on sources of inflation inertia, we argue that monetary policy uncertainty helps determine the sluggish adjustment of expectations to nominal disturbances. Estimating a model in which rational individuals learn over time about shifts in US monetary...

We analyse the importance of ERM membership for macroeconomic performance by comparing the behaviour of real output growth and inflation of members and non-members of the ERM. Taking the traditional aggregate supply and demand model as the basis for the analysis, we propose and implement an...

This Paper proposes a markedly different transmission from monetary policy to the macroeconomy, focusing on how policy changes nominal inertia in the Phillips curve. Using recent theoretical developments, we examine the properties of a small, estimated US monetary model distinguishing four...

This Paper proposes a new measure of contagion that is good at anticipating future vulnerabilities. Building on previous work, it uses correlations of equity markets across countries to measure contagion, but in a departure from previous practice, measures contagion using the relationship of...

This paper tests for the optimality of consumption across Canadian provinces. The results indicate that consumption is highly integrated within the central and eastern core of the country, based around Ontario and Quebec. This is not true for provinces in the western half of the country,...

This paper uses consumption patterns across countries to measure capital market integration. It argues that earlier empirical tests of this type were potentially mis-specified and proposes a more robust specification. The results indicate that Japan was the only industrialized country for which...