We focus on the role that the transmission of information between a multilateral (the IMF) and a country has for the optimal design of conditional reforms. Our model predicts that when agency problems are especially severe, and/or IMF information is valuable, a centralized control is indeed...

Why are socially beneficial reforms not implemented? One simple answer to this question (which has received little attention in the literature) is that this may be caused by generalized uncertainty about the effectiveness of reforms. If agents are unsure about whether a proposed reform will...

New Keynesian Phillips Curves (NKPC) have been extensively used in the analysis of monetary policy, but yet there are a number of issues of concern about how they are estimated and then related to the underlying macroeconomic theory. The first is whether such equations are identified. To check...

This paper theoretically investigates the impact of European integration on employment by developing a new-keynesian model where fiscal policy effectively reduces firms’ market power. Stronger product market competition is shown to reduce the marginal ability of governments to improve...

This paper analyzes the evolution of the degree of global cyclical interdependence over the period 1960-2005. We categorize the 106 countries in our sample into three groups – industrial countries, emerging markets, and other developing economies. Using a dynamic factor model, we then...

This paper examines the impact of rising trade and financial integration on international business cycle comovement among a large group of industrial and developing countries. The results provide at best limited support for the conventional wisdom that globalization has increased the degree of...

Low international competitiveness of a set of euro area countries, which have become evident by large current account deficits and rising risk premiums on government bonds, is one of the most challenging economic policy issues for Europe. We analyse the role of private restructuring and public...

This paper analyzes the potential advantages and disadvantages of the introduction of the common European currency for the German labor market. First, experiences of the German currency union of 1990 cannot be transferred to the European case. Second, the loss of the instrument of nominal...

We examine the interaction between foreign aid and binding borrowing constraint for a recipient country. We also analyze how these two instruments affect economic growth via non-linear relationships. First of all, we develop a two-country, two-period trade-theoretic model to develop testable...

Agricultural credit is one of the most crucial inputs in all agricultural development programmes. Access of rural credit has still remained scarce in India. Primary Agriculture Credit Societies (PACS) working at grass-root level, having direct contact with the rural people and meet their...