Suchergebnisse

We construct a dynamic theory of sovereign debt and structural reforms with limited enforcement and moral hazard. A sovereign country in recession wishes to smooth consumption. It can also undertake costly reforms to speed up recovery. The sovereign can renege on contracts by suffering a stochastic cost. The constrained optimal allocation (COA) prescribes imperfect insurance with non-monotonic dynamics for consumption and effort. The COA is decentralized by a competitive equilibrium with markets for renegotiable GDP-linked one-period debt. The equilibrium features debt overhang: reform effort decreases in a high debt range. We also consider environments with less complete markets. (JEL D82, E21, E23, E32, F34, H63)

In 1994, Congress passed 42 U.S.C. §14141, a statute authorizing the United States Attorney General to seek equitable relief against local and state police agencies that are engaged in a pattern or practice of unconstitutional misconduct. Although police departments in some of the nation's largest cities have now undergone this sort of structural reform litigation, there has been little empirical research on the topic. Drawing on original interviews, court documents, statistical data, and media reports, this dissertation describes the federal government's use of structural reform litigation in American police departments and theorizes on its effectiveness. It shows that, under the right circumstances, structural reform litigation is uniquely effective at combating misconduct in police departments. It forces local municipalities to prioritize investments into police misconduct regulations. It utilizes external monitoring to ensure that frontline officers substantively comply with top-down mandates. And it provides police executives with legal cover to implement wide-ranging reforms aimed at curbing misconduct. Although expensive, structural reform litigation may ultimately pay for itself through reducing a police department's civil liability. But structural reform litigation is far from a perfect regulatory mechanism. Successful organizational reform requires continual support from municipal leaders, dedication by executives within the targeted agency, and buy-in by frontline officers. This suggests that structural reform litigation alone is insufficient to transform a law enforcement agency. The financial burden of structural reform litigation falls on local police agencies over a relatively short period of time. Additional questions remain about whether targeted agencies will sustain reforms after federal intervention ends and about whether this type of federal intervention makes officers less aggressive. This dissertation concludes by showing how the lessons from structural reform litigation can inform future regulations of law enforcement.

AbstractThis article examines the role of reform in maintaining economic growth in the circumstances in which work‐age is declining more rapidly than total population. Traditional factor‐driven growth can still contribute if reform increases labour force participation, most significantly through easing restrictions on rural–urban migration through reform of the household registration system and other means. The other potential contributor to growth in the new era is reform to raise productivity. This requires more fundamental institutional change, which depends on clear visions of the framework for a modern market economy, encompassing the rule of law and stronger property rights.

In this thesis, I study different dimensions of the interaction between economic outcomes and EU economic governance with a specific emphasis on the framework for fiscal policy and fiscal stabilization. Each of the three chapters consists of a self-contained research article followed by the corresponding appendix. Chapters 1 and 2 refer to the institutional status quo and examine the impact of existing rules. By contrast, Chapter 3 takes a forward-looking perspective and considers the effects associated with a specific potential reform of the framework.

The objective of this paper is to investigate which factors - macroeconomic, policy - related or institutional - foster the implementation of structural reforms. To this objective, we look at episodes of structural reforms over three decades across 40 OECD and EU countries and link them to such factors. Our results suggest that structural reforms implementation is more likely during deep recessions and when unemployment rates are high. Moreover, the further distant from best practices, the more likely a country implements reforms. External pressures, such as being subject to a financial assistance programme, or being part of the EU Single Market facilitated pro-competitive reforms. If at all, low interest rates tend to promote rather than discourage structural reforms, while there seems no clear link between fiscal policy and reforms. Moreover, reforms in product markets tend to increase the likelihood of labour market reforms following suit. Many robustness checks have been carried out which confirm our main results.