Throughout the industrialised world the banking sector has embarked on a programme of restructuring and consolidation. In Japan the severity of the banking crisis has recently forced both the banking sector and the authorities to recognise deep-rooted problems and to take decisive action. In...

Although a large series of papers have been concerned with macroeconomic issues such as price stability or employment, very few studies have discussed the impact of the euro on the competitive structure of European banking markets. Two questions are being addressed in this paper: How does the...

It is not so long ago that policy makers thought that excessive regional disparities would disappear automatically in the long run. Arbitrage possibilities arising from competition and factor mobility were expected to induce a more than average growth performance in lagging regions. Having the...

The EIB finances a large number of projects in support of EU policies including social and economic cohesion, that is to reduce regional disparities in income. Since 1995, the EIB Evaluation Department has looked at over 100 projects where the Bank has been involved, normally along the lines of...

Economists agree at least on this: it is difficult to find evidence for, or merely to imagine any growth mechanism that does not work through the increase of a stock of capital in one way or another. From a more policy point of view - in particular in terms of the debate of economic development...

The European Union is facing challenges that have important implications for its economy as a whole and for regional cohesion in particular. The transition to the euro had already started, as had the process of enlargement towards Central and Eastern European countries. This occurs against a...

Europe, as all modern economies, is shifting towards an information-based society, where Information Technology (IT) is dramatically modifying patterns of production and consumption and the modern way of life. Low-cost data processing and transmission technologies are leading the way not only in...

Even though the industrial revolution started in Europe, many commentators suggest that European entrepreneurship has become an oxymoron. The facts of the case are, however, growing against them. For instance, Europeans nowadays run a fair share of Silicon Valley companies. Examples include...

Many observers suspect economic growth to be inextricably associated with inequality: growth alone need not bring about unalloyed, uncontroversial increases in economic well-being because rising average income levels might come together with increasing disparities between rich and poor....

The late 1990s saw one of the most rapid diffusions of a new technology seen in history. Within the space of 5 years the number of Internet users reached 50 million. This compares with the 13 years required by TV to reach the same number of users in the 1950s and 1960s, and the 40 years that...