This paper presents and evaluates pharmaceutical policies in the EU aimed at the rational use of medicines and at keeping pharmaceutical spending under control. Policy makers are growing more aware that by regulating pharmaceutical markets correctly, considerable savings can be achieved without...

The aim of this paper is to illustrate the methodological approach used by the Commission services (DG ECFIN/C2) to carry out, in a systematic and harmonised way, public debt sustainability analysis (DSA) for EU Member States. Analysing recent and prospective public debt developments and risks...

This paper presents the results of long run labour productivity and GDP growth rate projections (until 2050) for each of the 25 EU Member States and provides a detailed overview of the forecast methodology used. These projections were undertaken in order to provide an internationally comparable...

The purpose of the present paper is to review the sources of France's trade surplus in recent years and to attribute trade balance movements strictly to those determinants of trade flows suggested by economic theory. These determinants are price and/or cost developments, and demand in France and...

The governments of the European Union are facing important challenges that may impact both their need and their capacity to collect taxes. First, ageing will increase some social spending while reducing the potential of some tax bases such as labour. Second, globalisation has the potential to...

The global downturn is now strongly affecting EU labour markets. In light of the downward revision to the growth projections and the uncertainty created by the financial meltdown, the outlook for employment has deteriorated considerably. This would also be consistent with the experience from...

Intrinsically trustworthy agents never cheat. A society's willingness to trust and the quality of its institutions have their origins in the intrinsic trustworthiness of its citizens. Trustworthiness is the basis for maximizing output in economic exchange and in explaining differences in...

The instrumental variables strategy is commonly employed in empirical research. For correct inference using this econometric technique, the instruments must be perfectly exogenous and relevant. In fact, the standard t-ratio test statistic used in this context yields unreliable and often...

This paper introduces endogenous capital income tax rates as in Schmitt-Grohe and Uribe (1997), into the overlapping generations model with endogenous labor and consumption in both periods of life (e.g., Cazzavillan and Pintus, 2004). In contrast with the previous result that the existence of...

Israel’s policies regarding Lebanon have been dependent on public opinion, which is very volatile. The citizens of Israel did not favor the occupation of the security zone in South Lebanon because of the Four Mothers movement, and it influenced the government to withdraw military forces...