Emmanuel Mourlon-Druol, (2017), “Rethinking Franco-German relations: a historical perspective”, Bruegel, 7 November Franco-German relations as the ‘engine’ of European integration are widely perceived to have stalled in recent years. German economic and political strength, coupled with relative French economic and political weakness, help to explain this situation.The re-election of Angela Merkel and the election of Emmanuel Macron in 2017 created a new potential basis for a strong, like-minded Franco-German alliance …Read More

Andrew Rettman, (2017), “New ‘momentum’ for EU tax haven sanctions”, EuObserver, 7 November EU finance ministers discussed the tax haven blacklist in Brussels on Tuesday (7 November) in the wake of fresh revelations, the so-called ‘Paradise Papers’, which showed how US tech giant Apple, for one, used the British crown dependency of Jersey to avoid paying billions in taxes on its European profits. Relevant Posts : Nikos Chrysoloras,Viktoria Dendrinou, Rainer …Read More

Nikos Chrysoloras,Viktoria Dendrinou, Rainer Buergin, (2017),  “EU Vows Tax Action After Paradise Paper Leaks”, Bloomberg, 7 November The days in paradise may be numbered for those seeking refuge from heavy tax burdens in remote islands. Finance ministers representing the world’s largest market vowed to take action following the leak of records exposing prominent members of the global business A-list.(..)The new set of data taken from an offshore law firm again exposed the …Read More

Francesco Papadia, Alexander Roth, (2017), “The Eurosystem – Too opaque and costly?”, Bruegel, 6 Νovember The European Central Bank (ECB) and the Eurosystem face a lot ofscrutiny when it comes to monetary policy, but their operational performance attracts less attention. Still, being a public institution, the ECB and the 19 National Central Banks (NCBs), which together form the Eurosystem, have to justify their methods and costs. Thus, this blog post will …Read More

Elisabeth Falck, Mathias Hoffmann, Patrick Hürtgen, (2017), ” How disagreement in inflation expectations can influence the transmission of monetary policy”, VoxEU, 6 November Existing theoretical and empirical evidence suggests that less expansionary monetary policies lead to lower inflation and dampened inflation expectations. This column considers how the dispersion of inflation expectations can affect this relationship. The results show that an increase in the policy rate can give rise to higher …Read More

Edmund S. Phelps, (2017), “Nothing Natural About the Natural Rate of Unemployment”, Project Syndicate, 2 November With unemployment reaching very low levels in major economies, despite low – and slowly rising – inflation, it’s time for central banks to rethink their reliance on the so-called natural rate. No numerical target for this rate can serve as an anchor for monetary policy. Relevant Posts Darvas, Zsolt, Pichler, David, (2017), «Employment in …Read More

Maurice Obstfeld, Mahvash S. Qureshi, (2017), “Understanding the Global Financial Cycle”, IMF Blog, 27 October The boom and bust in cross-border capital flows around the global financial crisis, and in its aftermath, have rekindled debates on the existence and implications of a “global financial cycle.” The traditional open-economy (“Mundell-Fleming”) model postulates that countries face a “trilemma”: a trade-off among the objectives of exchange rate stability, free capital mobility, and independent …Read More

Marek Dabrowksi, (2017), “Euro-area enlargement: a new opening?”, Bruegel, 2 November 8 of the EU27 have not yet joined the Euro, and progress in euro-area enlargement seems to have stalled. Commission President Juncker wants to give new momentum to the process, but the path is full of political and technical hurdles. The Euro is unlikely to have any new members soon. Relevant Posts Kregel, Jan, (2017), «A Two-Tier Eurozone or …Read More