This chapter looks at US household sector micro data since 1989, to explore the relation between income inequality and financial fragility from a macro perspective. In contrast with a portfolio (and wealth inequality) approach to household financial instability, which focuses on the investments...

In spite of many claims that the European treaties cannot be reformed, European economic governance has evolved substantially over the last two decades. The process has erected an ever more complex system of rules, deadlines, and commitments conferring more power on the European Commission and...

This paper traces the evolution of the concept of the cyclically adjusted budget from the 1930s to the present. The idea of balancing the budget over the cycle was first conceived in Sweden in the 1930s by the economists of the Stockholm School and was soon reinterpreted and incorporated into...