This paper provides a comprehensive overview of the issues, policies, and political economy of infrastructure investment, and a review of empirical literature of the relationship between growth and infrastructure. Empirical estimations using the growth accounting framework for a panel of 123...

In the last 33 years after the People's Republic of China's (PRC) openness and reform, huge amounts of foreign direct investment (FDI) flowed into the PRC. The capital inflow and technology spillover in turn enabled outward FDI from the PRC. This paper gives a brief introduction to the PRC's...

Under near zero United States (US) interest rates, the international dollar standard malfunctions. Emerging markets with naturally higher interest rates are swamped with "hot money" inflows. Emerging market central banks intervene to prevent their currencies from rising precipitously. They...

Die Mitgliedstaaten der EU gewährten 2010 Agrarbeihilfen in Höhe von 10,3 Mrd. Euro. Die derzeitige Rahmenregelung zur Kontrolle von Agrarbeihilfen läuft im Dezember 2013 aus und muss für 2014 bis 2020 neu gefasst werden. Dies bietet die Gelegenheit einer Neuausrichtung. Die Autoren...

Die drückende Finanznot vieler Kommunen lässt Wissenschaft und Praxis nach einer grundsätzlichen Lösung der Schuldenproblematik suchen. Dabei rückt zunehmend das Insolvenzverfahren für Kommunen in den Fokus. Es wird als eher marktwirtschaftlichautonom wirkender Lösungsmechanismus den...

The Federal Reserve is a hugely powerful institution whose policies ramify with enormous effect throughout the economy. In the wake of the Great Recession, monetary policy focused on quantitative easing. Now, there is talk of normalizing monetary policy and interest rates. That conversation is...

Demographic change inevitably shifts the balance between contributors and recipients in the pension system. Moreover, in the German pension system benefit levels are closely linked to the current state of economic prosperity. Therefore, in the coming decades stabilisation of old-age security...

Thanks to the reform process between 1992 and 2007, Germany was in a very good position to master demographic change. These reforms were farsighted, they stabilised the public pension system and they significantly increased employment, the foundation of every old age provision. The 'Pension...

The 2014 pension reform has three main components. First disability pensions have been increased by about two earnings points, an average monthly gain of 40 euros. In addition low wages in the four years preceding disability-related retirement will now be disregarded. However, since these new...