The recent financial crisis has been characterized by unprecedented monetary policy interventions of central banks with the intention to stabilize financial markets and the real economy. This paper sheds light on the actual impact of monetary policy on stock liquidity and thereby addresses its...

Fiscal policymakers are expected to conduct countercyclical policies to mitigate cyclical fluctuations of output, but the assessment of cyclical conditions in real time is subject to considerable uncertainty. They face two types of risk: (i) launching discretionary measures to support or dampen...

Rather than stabilising aggregate demand, discretionary fiscal policy tends to amplify cyclical fluctuations of output. The commonly accepted reasons are political economy and uncertainty. In the EU, the pro-cyclical nature of discretionary fiscal policy has also been associated with the...

The growing inequality of market income has attracted considerable attention; less so the redistribution of income. This article analyses key trends and drivers of income redistribution in the EU and the world. It shows that in the EU increasing redistribution has largely stabilised the...