We examine the relationship between institutions, culture and cyclical fluctuations for a sample of 45 European, Middle Eastern and North African countries. Better governance is associated with shorter and less severe contractions and milder expansions. Certain cultural traits, such as lack of...

This paper describes a methodology to estimate the coefficients, to test specification hypotheses and to conduct policy exercises in multi-country VAR models with cross unit interdependencies, unit specific dynamics and time variations in the coefficients. The framework of analysis is Bayesian:...

We study the issue of income convergence across countries and regions with a Bayesian estimator which allows us to use information in an efficient and flexible way. We argue that the very slow convergence rates to a common level of per-capita income found, e.g., by Barro and Xavier...

This paper examines the relationship between the equity premium and the risk free rate at three different maturities using post 1973 data for a panel of 7 OECD countries. We show the existence of subsample instabilities, of some cross country differences and of inconsistencies with the...

This paper formally examines the implications of international consumption risk sharing for a panel of industrialized countries. We theoretically derive the international consumption insurance proposition in a simple setup and show how it should be modified in more complicated models. We...

This paper provides a method to estimate time varying coefficients structural VARs which are non-recursive and potentially overidentified. The procedure allows for linear and non-linear restrictions on the parameters, maintains the multi-move structure of standard algorithms and can be used to...

We investigate the theoretical conditions for effectiveness of government consumption expenditure expansions using US, Euro area and UK data. Fiscal expansions taking place when monetary policy is accommodative lead to large output multipliers in normal times. The 2009-2010 packages need not...

We date turning points of the reference cycle for 19 Mediterranean countries and analyze their structure and interdependences. Fluctuations are volatile and not highly correlated across countries; recessions are deep but asynchronous making average output losses in the area limited....

We study the contribution of money to business cycle fluctuations in the US, the UK, Japan, and the Euro area using a small scale structural monetary business cycle model. Constrained likelihood-based estimates of the parameters are provided and time instabilities analyzed. Real balances are...