The aim of this report, which has been prepared by a Task Force of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Eurosystem, is to describe and analyse the main developments in labour supply and its determinants in the euro area, review the links between labour supply and labour market institutions,...

The rapid increase in credit in an economy is now commonly perceived to be one of the leading indicators of financial instability. This view has been reinforced by the aftermath of the international financial crisis, which commenced mid 2007. A key policy response has been to focus on the ratio...

Do asset prices affect real activity? This question has taken on a new importance in recent years, as asset values first surged at the end of 1990s and, thereafter, dramatically retreated. This report reviews the available theoretical and empirical evidence regarding asset price and wealth...

This paper analyzes the stability over time of the econometric process for Euro-area inflation since 1970, focusing in particular on the behaviour of the so-called persistence parameter (the sum of the coefficients on the lagged dependent variables). Perhaps surprisingly, in light of the Lucas...

Calvo-style models of nominal rigidities currently provide the dominant paradigm for understanding the linkages between wage and price dynamics. Recent empirical implementations stress the idea that these models link inflation to the behavior of the labor share of income. Gali, Gertler, and...

Despite their popularity as theoretical tools for illustrating the effects of nominal rigidities, some have questioned whether models based on Taylor-style staggered contracts can match the persistence of the empirical inflation process. This paper presents some general theoretical results about...