The smoothing impact of fiscal stabilizers (proxied by government expenditures) on business cycle volatility is studied for a panel of European Union (EU) countries in the period 1970-1999. Special emphasis is put on the investigation of possible nonlinearities in the relationship between Gross...

Using a theoretical model based on dynamic optimizing agents, we test empirically the Ricardian equivalence proposition (REP) for the EU-15 countries. The theoretical setting allows us to obtain estimates of the structural parameters of the model and to test directly the hypothesis implied by...

This paper uses model averaging techniques to identify robust predictors of sovereign default episodes on a pooled database for 46 emerging economies over the period 1980-2004. Sovereign default episodes are defined according to Standard & Poor’s or by non-concessional International Monetary...

Using a unique dataset comprising information for more than 900 firms in the machine building sector in Belarus, this paper investigates the determinants of firm growth for an economy where state ownership of enterprises is widespread. It uses panel data models based on generalizations of...