A major economic reason for the introduction of the euro was its supposedly positive effect on intra-EMU trade. Existing studies examine this suspicion indirectly using non-EMU data and report ambiguous results. We estimate the euro-effect directly from data that include EMU observations. Using...

It is widely argued that Europe`s unified monetary policy calls for international coordination at the fiscal level. We survey the issues involved in such coordination in the perspective of macroeconomic stabilization. A simple model identifies the circumstances under which coordination may be...

We consider the 'final' (deciding) set in a tennis match. We examine whether it is true that the chances for both players to win the match are equal at the beginning of the final set, even though they were not equal at the beginning of the match. We also test whether it is easier for an unseeded...

The game of tennis raises many questions that are of interest to a statistician. Is it true that beginning to serve in a set gives an advantage? Are new balls an advantage? Is the seventh game in a set particularly important? Are top players more stable than other players? Do real champions win...

We study the effects of free trade areas on bilateral trade flows. We review and extend the previous empirical literature by embarking on the modelling of unobserved heterogeneity. We apply our preferred model to the case of the Asean Free Trade Area (AFTA). The estimation results suggest that...

Existing studies on the impact of the euro on goods trade report increments between 5% and 40%. These estimates are based on standard panel gravity models for the level of trade. We show that the residuals from these models exhibit upward trends over time for the euro countries, and that this...