Do flexibility-enhancing reforms imply more employment instability? Using individual-level data from harmonised household surveys for 26 advanced countries, this paper analyses the effects of product and labour market reforms on transitions in and out of employment. Results indicate that reforms...

Reforms that boost growth by enhancing economic flexibility often meet strong opposition related to concerns that they may imply adverse consequences for categories of workers. This study investigates how making product or labour market regulation more flexible changes workers’ risks of moving...

Italy’s policy of fiscal consolidation and growth-friendly structural reforms has substantially improved its economic prospects, but the adverse sentiment that the country has faced in the sovereign bond market over the past years has deep roots. It reflects lingering anxieties over the euro...

Norway’s dual income tax system achieves high levels of revenue collection and income redistribution, without overly undermining economic performance and while paying attention to environmental externalities. It treats capital and labour income in different ways: capital income is taxed at a...

What are the economic effects of implicit bank debt guarantees and who ultimately benefits from them? This paper finds that “financial excesses” – situations where bank credit reaches levels that reduce economic growth – have been stronger in OECD countries characterised by larger values...

Workers are exposed to the risk of permanent disability. We rely on a dynamic mechanism design approach to determine how imperfect information on health should optimally be used to improve the trade-off between inducing the able to work and providing insurance against disability. After deriving...