This brief reviews the main economic developments since transition in the three Baltic economies and highlights challenges for the future. Although the three economies went, in an almost synchronous fashion, through similar stages of catching up and financial convergence-driven booms and busts,...

This brief reviews the evolution of the US and the European labour markets since the beginning of the financial crisis. In the US, the unemployment rate and the share of long-term unemployment grew very fast, during the crisis, thereby reaching levels close to those in the EU. Does that mean...

The policy brief analyzes the relative performance of the Czech and Slovak economies between the official confirmation of Slovakia's euro-area entry in mid-2008 and end- 2010. The analysis suggests that both economies continued to evolve in a highly similar manner. Czech real exports, as well as...

This policy brief analyzes whether the exposure to the CEE10 region is a risk for parent banks. Simultaneously, risks for the CEE10 countries implied by the strong presence of foreign-owned banks as well as possible feedback loops are discussed. Ongoing financial market turbulences within the...

There is a widespread perception that imbalances within the euro area are not adjusting, the major difficulty being that the competitive disinflation processes required in deficit countries are painful, while no strong incentives are always available in surplus countries to reduce their excess...

This Economic Brief reviews the main features of monetary policy frameworks implemented by the major central banks following the collapse of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates in the early 1970s. It discusses how these frameworks were affected by the academic views prevailing at...

Poverty increases were recorded mostly in terms of severe material deprivation and low work intensity rates starting from 2010 and were concentrated in those countries most severely hit by the crisis. Econometric estimates suggest that while measures of relative poverty do not appear to have...

This Economic Brief recapitulates some main insights on the role of structural reform for adjustment and growth in the EU. Its aim is threefold. First, the Brief discusses recent reform efforts in EU countries. Second, it discusses possible effects from reforms in labour and product markets by...

The Brief investigates the role of policy uncertainty in explaining the persistently high unemployment rate in the euro area after the Great Recession and the different impact of uncertainty on flows into and out of unemployment.