Despite the launch of a new strategy for growth in Europe (the Europe 2020 strategy) and the ongoing efforts to design a new international financial architecture, prospects for an economic recovery of Europe remain dim. Public deficits and debts will have to be reduced at a faster pace, with...

In this paper a distinction is made between the immediate technical-financial causes that unleashed the crisis in the United States, and its macroeconomic causes, which also explain its international transmission. Two formal paradigmatic models are considered. The first is Li’s formula on...

In Italy the use of bond covenants is restrained by the predominance of SMEs, the significant role of relationship banking, the high costs related to public placements, the lack of investors‘ financial culture, the low amount of loans normally requested by each firm and the lack of liquidity...

The drive towards radical reforms of financial regulation is weakening as financial firms seem to be returning to calmer waters. The proposals that now appear to be having a higher probability of adoption leave the financial structure and its regulation substantially unchanged. An analysis of...

Up to now, the G20 has supervised the process to revitalize the real economy affected by the Great Recession through fiscal stimuli and a very easy monetary policy, and to rescue the battered financial system by injecting capital into giant banks and firms. The G20 is now turning its attention...

This paper explores the rise of money and class society in ancient Greece, drawing historical and theoretical parallels to the case of ancient Egypt. In doing so, the paper examines the historical applicability of the chartalist and metallist theories of money. It will be shown that the origins...

Paul A. Samuelson taught that every society has to choose between butter and guns. Individuals have to make the Gossen test of utility equivalence. The authors of the recent Mirrlees Review seem to believe that they can avoid this choice by considering taxation only. But how can one decide on...

Money, in this paper, is defined as a power relationship of a specific kind, a stratified social debt relationship, measured in a unit of account determined by some authority. A brief historical examination reveals its evolving nature in the process of social provisioning. Money not only...

Money, in this paper, is defined as a power relationship of a specific kind, a stratified social debt relationship, measured in a unit of account determined by some authority. A brief historical examination reveals its evolving nature in the process of social provisioning. Money not only...

This paper explores the rise of money and class society in ancient Greece, drawing historical and theoretical parallels to the case of ancient Egypt. In doing so, the paper examines the historical applicability of the chartalist and metallist theories of money. It will be shown that the origins...