Wolff, Guntram, (2016), “Getting eurozone deposit insurance right promises benefits”, Bruegel, 5 January The European Commission presented its proposals for European deposit insurance last November. Officials hope to stabilise the banking system and decouple banks’ financing costs from the solvency of their host states. This would achieve the original aim of Banking Union: to break the link between states and their banking systems. Relevant Posts Gros, Daniel, Belke, Ansgar, (2015), …Read More

Best, Michael, Brockmeyer, Anne, Kleven, Henrik, Spinnewijn, Johannes, Waseem, Mazhar, (2016) “Designing tax policy in high-evasion economies”, VoxEU, 5 January Developing economies are characterised by low tax revenue and widespread tax evasion. This column assesses what tax policy instruments governments should use to raise revenue. Optimal tax policy in developing countries may diverge from what is prescribed in standard textbook models. A turnover tax, for instance, is known to distort …Read More

Stiglitz, Joseph, (2016), “The Great Malaise Continues”, Project Syndicate, 3 January The year 2015 was a hard one all around. Brazil fell into recession. China’s economy experienced its first serious bumps after almost four decades of breakneck growth. The eurozone managed to avoid a meltdown over Greece, but its near-stagnation has continued, contributing to what surely will be viewed as a lost decade. Relevant Posts Dixon, H. (2014) “A New …Read More

Friedman, Alexander, (2015), “How the Fed Just Reduced Inequality”, Project Syndicate, 16 December The US Federal Reserve has finally done it, raising interest rates for the first time in almost a decade. The ramifications for interest-rate spreads, emerging-market equities, and housing demand, among much else, are the subject of widespread debate. But, as markets learn to cope with a less accommodative monetary policy, there could be an important silver lining, …Read More

Berger, Bennet, (2015), “Non-performing loans in Italy and selected European countries”, Bruegel publications, 18 December Fears of a banking crisis in Italy are surfacing after four small Italian banks were rescued in November.The rescue plan involves transferring the banks’ bad loans to a single bad bank. Non-performing loans (NPLs), loans in default or close to being in default, continue to raise doubts about the health of the banking sector in …Read More

Schuster, Joachim, (2015), “Old Wine In New Bottles: The Economic Priorities Of The European Commission In 2016”, Social Europe Journal, 4 December A new annual cycle of EU economic policy coordination – aka the European Semester – has begun with the European Commission’s (EC) latest Annual Growth Survey (AGS). The AGS sets out the EC’s views on the EU’s social and economic priorities and provides the building blocks for the …Read More

Darvas, Zsolt, Leandro, Álvaro, (2015), “Naughty students or the wrong school: why is the European Semester proving ineffective?”, Bruegel Blog, 18 November. The fundamental problem of economic policy coordination in the EU is that national policymakers are accountable to their national parliaments and focus on national interests, which in many cases differ widely in different member states. It is therefore not all that surprising that economic policy coordination in the EU hardly …Read More

Gaspar, Vitor, Hagan, Sean, (2015), “Corruption : A Hidden Tax on Growth”, iMFdirect, 5 November. In recent years, citizens’ concerns about allegations of corruption in the public sector have become more visible and widespread. From São Paulo to Johannesburg, citizens have taken to the streets against graft. In countries like Chile, Guatemala, India, Iraq, Malaysia and Ukraine, they are sending a clear and loud message to their leaders: Address corruption! Relevant Posts Koulovatianos, Christos, Tsoukalas, …Read More