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- 31 July 2004
- OCCASIONAL PAPER SERIES - No. 19Details
- Abstract
- This paper analyses trends in sectoral specialisation in the EU and concludes the following: 1) The European production structure appears more homogenous than that of the US. 2) While sectoral specialisation has shown a slight increase in some smaller euro area countries towards the end-1990s, it is too early to detect any potential impact of EMU. 3) Despite some changes in sectoral composition, the business cycles of euro area countries became more synchronised over the 1990s, which may be seen as reassuring from the point of view of the single monetary policy. 4) Sectoral re-allocation accounts for as much as 50% of the increase in labour productivity growth in business sector services in the euro area. 5) The slowdown of European labour productivity growth relative to the US since the mid-1990s is explained by a stronger performance in the US wholesale and retail trade, financial intermediation and high-tech manufacturing sectors.
- JEL Code
- E32 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Business Fluctuations, Cycles
E22 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Capital, Investment, Capacity
E23 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Production
E24 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Employment, Unemployment, Wages, Intergenerational Income Distribution, Aggregate Human Capital
- 10 April 2006
- OCCASIONAL PAPER SERIES - No. 44Details
- Abstract
- This paper analyses the degree of competition in the euro area services sector and its effects on labour productivity and relative prices in that sector over the period 1980-2003. The importance of the euro area services sector has significantly increased over time; it now accounts for around 70% of the euro area's total nominal value added and employment. Labour productivity growth across the euro area services industries appears to be characterised by a high degree of diversity and the level of services inflation is on average higher than aggregate inflation. Investigating several proxies of market competition for the non-financial business services, the paper finds that limited competition in services tends to hamper labour productivity growth in the services sector. Moreover, results tend to suggest that measures aimed at increasing services market competition may have a dampening impact on relative price changes in some services sectors and thus temporarily on aggregate inflation.
- JEL Code
- E : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics
- 14 April 2010
- OCCASIONAL PAPER SERIES - No. 109Details
- Abstract
- In mid-September 2008, a global financial crisis erupted which was followed by the most serious worldwide economic recession for decades. As in many other regions of the world, governments in the euro area stepped in with a wide range of emergency measures to stabilise the financial sector and to cushion the negative consequences for their economies. This paper examines how and to what extent these crisis-related interventions, as well as the fall-out from the recession, have had an impact on fiscal positions and endangered the longer-term sustainability of public finances in the euro area and its member countries. The paper also discusses the appropriate design of fiscal exit and consolidation strategies in the context of the Stability and Growth Pact to ensure a rapid return to sound and sustainable budget positions. Finally, it reviews some early lessons from the crisis for the future conduct of fiscal policies in the euro area.
- JEL Code
- E5 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit
E2 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy - Network
- Eurosystem Monetary Transmission Network
- 20 May 2016
- OCCASIONAL PAPER SERIES - No. 173Details
- Abstract
- This paper reviews the debate on the longer-term requirements for safeguarding the euro as a currency beyond the state that is anchored through collective governance instead of a central government. The strengthening of EU economic and financial governance in the wake of the euro area crisis goes a long way towards creating the minimum conditions for a more perfect EMU. At the same time, the current principle of nation states coordinating their sovereignty to
- JEL Code
- E4 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Money and Interest Rates
E6 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook
F15 : International Economics→Trade→Economic Integration
F33 : International Economics→International Finance→International Monetary Arrangements and Institutions
- 13 February 2017
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 35Details
- Abstract
- At the 25th anniversary of the Maastricht Treaty, this paper reviews the merits of introducing a safe sovereign asset for the eurozone. The triple euro area crisis showed the costly consequences of ignoring the ‘safety trilemma’. Keeping a national safe sovereign asset (the German bund) as the cornerstone of the financial system is incompatible with having free capital mobility and maintaining economic and financial stability in a monetary union. The euro area needs a single safe sovereign asset. However, eurobonds are only foreseen after full fiscal integration. To address the safety trilemma member countries must therefore act as the joint sovereign behind the euro and choose from two options. First, they could establish a credible multipolar system of safe national sovereign assets. For this purpose, they could all issue both senior and junior tranches of each national government bond in a proportion such that the expected safety of the senior tranche is the same across countries while the junior tranche would absorb any sovereign default risk. Additional issuance of national GDP-linked bonds could insure governments against a deep recession that might lead to a self-fulfilling default and thereby help to make the junior tranche less risky. The second option is that the member countries together produce a common safe sovereign asset for a truly integrated and stable monetary union by creating synthetic eurobonds comprising both a safe senior claim and a risky junior claim on a diversified portfolio of national government bonds. This appears a more effective solution to the safety trilemma – especially when euro area governments would also issue national GDP-linked bonds – but it requires flanking measures to control for moral hazard.
- JEL Code
- F33 : International Economics→International Finance→International Monetary Arrangements and Institutions
F34 : International Economics→International Finance→International Lending and Debt Problems
G15 : Financial Economics→General Financial Markets→International Financial Markets
H63 : Public Economics→National Budget, Deficit, and Debt→Debt, Debt Management, Sovereign Debt
H70 : Public Economics→State and Local Government, Intergovernmental Relations→General