Although austerity was particularly strong in the aftermath of the economic crisis of 2008 and its consequences in the euro area, Italian fiscal policies have been characterised by tough consolidation periods ever since the 1990s.

Beyond fleeting references, there is surprisingly little analysis about the interrelationship between fiscal policy and safe assets. This study analyses this interrelationship and argues that, at a certain point, more public debt will not “buy” more safety: countries face a kind of “safe...

Of the many good ideas currently being discussed in Europe, the most interesting proposal is to let national unemployment schemes manage the regular business cycle, and to provide European financing to extend the duration of unemployment benefits during a crisis period.

For the first seven years of this decade, the Baltic countries experienced very rapid GDP growth. In 2007, though, the boom period turned to bust as country-specific factors such as the slowdown in credit growth dampened domestic demand growth. This was followed by the international financial...

This article provides an overview of the impact of public sector pay and employment cutbacks in EU countries and discusses their justifi cation as part of austerity packages. It begins with the outcomes in the countries first hit by the economic crisis before discussing the impact of the crisis...

This paper presents an analysis of the implications of Greece's intense and long-lasting fi scal and external imbalances for the potential efficacy of a discretionary fiscal policy response to the current recession. It argues that, given recent developments in interest rate spreads and the...