In January 2007 the International Monetary Fund (IMF) published, on an ad hoc basis, a series of financial soundness indicators (FSIs) based on a common methodology (the IMF compilation Guide) for 62 countries, including all 27 European Union countries. The European Central Bank (ECB), jointly...

This paper looks at fiscal sustainability and fiscal risks from a comprehensive, global perspective. It argues that the benefits of consolidation have to be re-assessed given that industrialised countries have entered uncharted waters with unsustainable public debt dynamics and enormous...

Stabilization of greenhouse gases at sustainable levels is the objective of the FCCC. Strategies to achieve this aim have been the object of intense debate. This paper focuses on one emissions trading system under scrutiny, Joint Implementation (JI). The basic premise of JI is that one nation...

The goal of the Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) is to stabilize the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at levels which avoid dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate (United Nations, 1992). This paper examines the performance and cost characteristics...

Using an applied general equilibrium model, we explore the impacts of uniform reduction targets, a uniform carbon tax, and permit trading in the Annex 1 countries for the period 2000-2020. Next, we assess the impacts of enlarging the A-1 coalition to the globe, and allow for global permit...

Empirical surveys find no significant impact of environmental regulation and environmental costs on international competitiveness. In the literature, we can find three hypotheses on the impact of environmental regulation. For the industrial-flight and pollution-haven hypothesis, there is no...

This paper sheds some light about privatisation in utilities. An empirical analysis based on sales in the electricity sector in 38 countries for the period 1977-97 shows that regulation is a crucial institutional variable in privatisation. Not only does it allow governments to increase the pace...

A number of recent papers have found that certain measures of pollution worsen and later improve as income per head increases. It is widely believed that the downhill portion of this inverted-U curve reflects an induced policy response; that, as incomes rise, citizens demand improvements in...