James, Harold, (2017), “The Renewal of Europe’s Center?”, Project Syndicate, 5 June British Prime Minister Theresa May, French President Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are different in many ways. May unexpectedly assumed her position last year after the Brexit vote, when her predecessor, David Cameron, resigned. Macron has even less experience: the presidency, which he just took over last month, is his first-ever elected position. Meanwhile, Merkel has served …Read More

Bershidsky, Leonid, (2017), “Europe’s Tax Competition Is Unfair and Inefficient”, Bloomberg, 31 May Juncker’s “see no evil, hear no evil” testimony was an extension of the LuxLeaks scandal that first broke in 2014. It transpired that more than 300 global companies, including Pepsi, McDonalds, Deutsche Bank and Amazon, had secured individual, secret tax rulings in the Grand Duchy. The scandal was huge, but its consequences haven’t lived up to the hype. Luxembourg codified its tax-ruling …Read More

Alesina, Alberto, Tabellini, Guido, Trebbi, Francesco, (2017), “Europe as an optimal political area: New findings”, Vox Eu, 2 June In the economic analysis of secession and integration, the answer to this question reflects a trade-off between the benefits of economies of scale and scope in the provision of global public goods on the one side, and the cost due to heterogeneity of preferences on the other (Alesina and Spolaore 1997). The …Read More

Reichlin, Lucrezia, (2017), “Vive l’Euro?”, Project Syndicate, 1 June Emmanuel Macron’s victory in the French presidential election on May 7 triggered a surge of optimism about the future of the European Union, and the eurozone in particular. This is partly because Macron ran an unambiguously pro-EU campaign, and was rewarded for it. But it is also because the threat of a populist government in one of the EU’s founding states is, …Read More

Cohen, Desmond, (2017), “Rethinking German Economic Policy”, Social Europe, 31 May It is only too evident that economic policy in Germany remains rooted in pre-Keynesian ideas that most macroeconomists rejected many years ago, and this helps explains the German Government’s intransigence in the face of persistent criticism – including now from the IMF. It has not been prepared to listen despite the fact that its policy stance has directly contributed to …Read More