The recent surge in inflation led many unions and firms to alter their bargaining and wage-setting policies. Using novel German firm-level survey data, we document the extent of state dependence in wage setting across firms and workers during periods of high and low inflation. We find state...

The aim of this study is to analyse the state of the competitiveness of seven Western Balkan economies and to suggest policy recommendations in order to increase their capacity to compete. Most countries from the Western Balkans have a persistent current account deficit of about 10% of GDP which...

Die meisten Westbalkanländer haben ein hohes und in der Regel persistentes Leistungsbilanzdefizit von annähernd 10% des BIP. Reduktionen des Leistungsbilanzdefizits der letzten Jahre sind vor allem auf krisenhafte Importzurückhaltung zurückzuführen. Das durchschnittliche Westbalkanland (im...

This paper provides robust estimates of the impact of both product and labour market regulations on unemployment using data for 24 European countries over the period 1998-2013. Controlling for country-fixed effects, endogeneity and a large set of covariates, results show that product market...

This paper provides a robust estimation of the impact of both product and labour market regulations on unemployment using data for 24 European countries over the period 1998-2013. Controlling for country-fixed effects, endogeneity and various covariates, results show that product market...

This paper attempts to analyse the macroeconomic effects of unemployment benefits in a small open economy. We adopt a stock–flow consistent (SFC) approach with an emphasis on the dynamics of the labour market. We numerically solve the model using a combination of estimation and calibration to...

Most of the countries of the OECD are still suffering from the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) (or as the Americans call it the Great Recession), but the Australian economy appears to be powering ahead. It is a miracle economy! Unlike most of the OECD countries, Australia did not even have a...

Whenever unemployment stays high for an extended period, it is common to see analyses, statements, and rebuttals about the extent to which the high unemployment is structural, not cyclical. This essay views the Beveridge Curve pattern of unemployment and vacancy rates and the related matching...

This paper evaluates the effects for the Spanish case of allowing greater flexibility regarding the weekly hours worked on the working week, employment and productivity. A baseline model economy is calibrated to reproduce the cross-sectional distribution of workweeks across plants, as well as...