This study explains the intensity of redistributive policies of Latin American leftist governments during the so-called "left turn" in the region. Based on theoretical models that analyze the implications of inequality in democracies with different economic and institutional structures, it...

The European Stability Mechanism (ESM) is the permanent crisis resolution mechanism for euro area countries. We analyze the costs of the current (suboptimal) refinancing design of the ESM and evaluate an alternative asset-backed securities (ABS) structure under different scenarios. Our...

The economic crisis of 2008–2009 will be known as the day when the creator knelt before its creation (Syll, 2010). Amid such economic mess created by economists (and so-called engineers) themselves, there seems to be a single economic perspective: every man for himself and save yourself if you...

In der Dezemberausgabe 2015 veröffentlichte der Wirtschaftsdienst einen Aufsatz zur Überprüfung des Stabilitäts- und Wachstumsgesetzes (StabG) von Henrike Michaelis, Steffen Elstner und Christoph M. Schmidt. Dazu erscheinen diese Replik und eine Erwiderung der Autoren.

The large Public Sector Purchase Programme (PSPP) which the ECB started in 2015 on the basis of monetary policy purposes, had major side-effects on fiscal policy. One concerns the programme's uncommon seigniorage effects. We find that the PSPP not only led to partly negative seigniorage gains,...

James Buchanan pioneered the political economics of public debt 60 years ago. In this paper, we contrast his thinking of the burden of debt, the public choice mechanisms that lead to excessive debt and the demand for constitutional restraints on public debt with its development, its...

Die weltwirtschaftlichen Rahmenbedingungen haben sich verschlechtert. Die protektionistische Tonart der US-Administration provoziert einen globalen Handelskonflikt. Dieser kann weitere Problemlagen wie eine Finanzmarktkrise in China oder in Europa auslösen. Nicht zuletzt gefährden auch die...

We use a New Keynesian DSGE model with search frictions on the housing market to evaluate how financing a labor tax reduction by higher property taxation affects the real economy and welfare. Search on the housing market enables us to explicitly model stocks and flows, which is necessary to...

This paper analyses economic developments in the Eurozone since its inception in 1999. In doing so, we document a process of economic divergence and polarization among those countries that joined the Eurozone during its first two years, which fits a typical 'core - periphery' pattern. We show...

The main directions on which channeled the FSA (Financial Surveillance Authority) the activity in Romania in 2014 were the development of non-bank financial markets and their contribution to economic growth. In this article we propose an analysis of how it has evolved the private pensions market...