The EU's CAP has changed significantly over theyears, largely as a result of international pressure through GATT and the WTO, but it still has the support of farm incomes as its main concern. The old CAP of market price support has more or less been displaced by decoupled income support, in the...

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are two large companies – ‘government-sponsored enterprises' (GSEs) – that are heavily involved in the secondary market for residential mortgages. The GSEs' expansion into lower quality mortgages, especially during the middleyears of the 2000s, was supported by...

During the subprime mortgage crisis of 2007–2008, previously profitable loans to subprime borrowers turned sour and investments thought to be as safe as government debt sustained severe and unexpected losses. The crisis reconfigured the US financial services industry and helped spark the worst...

This entry examines the approach of Hyman P. Minsky to financial crisis. Minsky famously developed an ‘investment theory of the cycle and a financial theory of investment'. His thesis was that, over the course of the cycle, behaviour changes in such a way that financial fragility develops....

On September 14, 2007, Northern Rock, a medium-sized bank specialising in residential mortgages, suffered the first substantial run of retail depositors in the UK since the 19th century. It had previously adopted a policy of fast growth, largely financing itself by borrowing in wholesale markets...

This article explores the development of Economic and Monetary Union in Europe from the Second World War through to the end of 2010. It concentrates primarily on the earlier part of the process and contrasts what has been implemented since 1999 with its antecedents and with the prescriptions...

The whole of Paley's contribution to economics is contained in a single chapter of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785). The object of ‘rational politics’ is to maximize ‘happiness’, and Paley argued that this is achieved by maximizing population. Population is determined by the total...

The euro zone crisis is commonly regarded as a sovereign debt crisis. This definition certainly applies to Greece, but the Irish case represents an almost pure specimen of a banking crisis voluntarily transformed into a sovereign crisis. A debt crisis in two small, peripheral economies could...

The global financial crisis that began in mid-2007 and exploded in the fall of 2008 shocked most economists. Some had raised concerns about the rapid growth in the housing market in developed countries, especially to “sub-prime,” high-risk borrowers. Others had been concerned about large...

Since 1 January 1999 the European Central Bank (ECB) has had sole responsibility for monetary policy in the euro area. Its main aim is to maintain price stability over the medium term. It is completely independent. The ECB has been successful in maintaining price stability and well-anchored...