The recent crisis in the United States has often been associated with substantial amounts of policy uncertainty. In this paper we ask how uncertainty about fiscal policy affects the impact of fiscal policy changes on the economy when the government tries to counteract a deep recession. The...

Between 1999 and the onset of the economic crisis in 2008 real exchange rates in Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain appreciated relative to the rest of the euro area. This divergence in competitiveness was reflected in the emergence of current account imbalances. Given that exchange rate...

Using an estimated large-scale New-Keynesian model, we assess welfare and business cycle consequences of a fiscal union within EMU. We differentiate between three different scenarios: public revenue equalisation, tax harmonisation and a centralised fiscal authority. Relative to the status quo,...

We present the estimated large-scale three-region DSGE model GEAR picturing Germany, the Euro Area and the Rest of the world. Compared to existing models of this type, GEAR incorporates a comprehensive fiscal block, involuntary unemployment and a complex international structure. We use the model...

We analyze the long-run growth effects of automation in the canonical overlapping generations framework. While automation implies constant returns to capital within this model class (even in the absence of technological progress), we show that it does not have the potential to lead to positive...

This paper analyzes the sustainability of fiscal debt contingent on fiscal policy operating in two fiscal regimes. The first regime is characterized by active policy (not reacting to debt) and the other by passive fiscal policy (reacting to debt). The average duration for which either regime can...

The VAR/SVAR (Vector Autoregressive and Structural Vector Autoregressive) models are the cornerstone of the contemporaneous empirical macroeconomic research, in particular for being able to measure the impact of fiscal policy shocks. They may be employed as atheoretical models, as well as a mean...

During the Covid-19 crisis, most OECD countries used short-time work (subsidized reductions in working hours) to preserve employment. This paper documents that short-time work affects the behavior of firms (supply) and households (demand). First, using household survey data from Germany, we show...