The changes that are taking place in the structure of the population of many Western countries are likely to require considerable adjustments in their social security programs. A partial shift from pay-as-you-go (PAYG) to funding is one of the solutions frequently considered. This paper, without...

There is a general consensus that monetary stability in Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) requires sustainable public finances of the member states. In order to maintain a high degree of sustainability in Stage III of EMU, attention might shift away from the numerical criteria regarding overall...

It has to be kept in mind that there is no general construction principle for a perfect composite leading indicator. It is only possible to optimise the construction of such an indicator with respect to specified demands. In the case of the EU Economic Sentiment Indicator the question is if top...

The purpose of the present paper is to review the sources of France's trade surplus in recent years and to attribute trade balance movements strictly to those determinants of trade flows suggested by economic theory. These determinants are price and/or cost developments, and demand in France and...

In this paper we discuss the role of tax and benefit systems in the context of the functioning of the labour markets and review recent progress made by EU Member States in reforming tax and benefit systems with a view to increasing economic incentives for higher employment and job creation.

A stable and predictable demand for money function is a pre-requisite for the use of targets for monetary aggregates as a suitable intermediate objective of monetary policy. In spite of the clear difficulties which have manifested themselves in the estimation of such money functions, empirical...