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This paper's field evidence is: (1) many official sectors rapidly forget the damage of the 1982-85 exchange rate liquidity crisis and reverted to what caused that crisis, namely a closed economy clean floats perspective; and (2) the 2006-2008/9 exchange rate liquidity shock would have been more drastic but for central bank currency swaps. This evidence is bolstered by a laboratory experiment that incorporates more aspects of real world complexity and more different sorts of official and private sector agents than are feasible in econometric or algebraic investigations and employs a new central bank cooperation-conflict model of exchange rate determination , and is within an umbrella theory of Pope, namely SKAT, the Stages of Knowledge Ahead Theory. SKAT allows for risk effects from stages omitted in normal models, including those from (a) difficulties of agents in evaluating alternatives in a complex environment in which the assumed maximization of expected utility is impossible; and (b) preference for safety and reliability is not trivialized. Our joint field plus laboratory evidence indicates that official sectors should maintain an international exchange rate oriented perspective, or better yet, a single world currency as recommended by Zhou Xiaochuan, head of the People's Bank of China. To avoid rapid forgetting of havoc from isolationist clean floats and the value of stable exchange rates, a new syllabus, as under the SKAT umbrella, is fundamental in the education of official sector members in order to furnish them with a coherent alternative intellectual framework to current university education that excludes liquidity crises.

Conclusions favorable to flexible exchange rates typically accord with expected utility theory in ignoring the costs that exchange rate uncertainty generates for governments, central banks, firms and unions in: (i) choosing among acts; and (ii) existing until learning the outcome of the chosen act. Allowing for these involves SKAT, the Stages of Knowledge Ahead Theory, Pope (1983, 1995, 2005), Pope, Leitner and Leopold (2006). A laboratory experiment suggests that (i) and (ii) together outweigh the advantages of having a flexible exchange rate as an additional instrument for managing a country?s international competitiveness goal.

The paper traces the dangers in the closed economy perspective of a monetary policy focused on a domestic inflation goal under a clean float. Field evidence of the damage wrought from this perspective is reinforced by that from a laboratory experiment. The laboratory experiment avoids measurement errors to which econometric estimation is subject concerning omitted or inadequately proxied determinants, non-normally distributed errors, inadequate degrees of freedom, false assumptions of temporal independence and false synchronicity in decision response lags to stimuli. Our laboratory experiment also embeds a new theory of exchange rate determination involving the uncontroversial power of fully cooperating central banks to totally fix the exchange rate. The new model is within a broader theory that includes risk effects normally excluded, SKAT, the Stages of Knowledge Ahead Theory. We use SKAT to analyse outliers in our experimental results, and indicate some new directions and foci for econometric work. Our laboratory results point to the superiority of dollarisation, currency unions, a single world money over even dirty floats that include the exchange rate as an objective in its own right.

Government expenditure can be highly variable, if used as a countercyclical instrument, or as a response to economic crises or as a means of rapidly altering other features of the economy. An alternative policy setting is to keep government expenditure changes gradual and modest. It is shown that whether a more discretionary or a more stable usage of government expenditures better attains official sector macroeconomic goals is difficult to determine theoretically, in part because of missed risk effects. But the detecting which policy better meets the official sector macroeconomic goals from analysis of historical data or inter-country comparisons suffers from confounding events and institutions. This study offers a fresh insight from laboratory experiments. Our laboratory results favour gradualism in government expenditures, ie support the advocacy of more stable government expenditures offered in Friedman (1969), in Vernengo and Rochon (2000), and in the 2006 German tax change controversy, by that country?s local government sector.

Anläßlich eines Symposiums, veranstaltet vom neu gegründeten Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit (IZA) in Bonn, legten sechs Ökonomen in einer "Petersberger Erklärung' Thesen zur Arbeitsmarktpolitik vor. Nachfolgend der Wortlaut der Erklärung

n.a. ; In this paper six authors propose guidelines for German labor market policy, to overcome current discouragement and lead to a new balance of social security and individual competetiveness. Crucial aspects in this regard should be a reformed tax system based on excise instead of income taxes, and a system of incentives (vouchers) to encourage further education and individual initiative in the event of unemployment. In addition the declaration pleads for economic regulation of immigration and demands more marketability of honorary work. The welfare state should not be shattered but has to stimulate the individual to take economic risks and chances. This paper has been forwarded to a broader German public in order to influence discussion on the future course of labor market policy.

Against the background of the worldwide financial market and economic crisis, leading German economists urge policymakers to maintain the reform course in labor market policy. The experts warn not to jeopardize the clearly positive effects of the recent reform efforts. The Petersberg Declaration also proposes an economic orientation of German immigration legislation and an improvement of the market for social services, which has so far been dominated by voluntary work. Moreover, the welfare state should encourage risk-taking as a key factor for mobility, innovation, and growth.

Vor dem Hintergrund der weltweiten Finanzmarkt- und Wirtschaftskrise fordern prominente Ökonomen zum Kurshalten in der deutschen Wirtschafts- und Arbeitsmarktpolitik auf. Die Experten legen einen Katalog mit Handlungsempfehlungen vor, der unter anderem die Korrektur falscher Erwerbsanreize durch das Workfare-Prinzip von Leistung und Gegenleistung im Sozialstaat vorsieht, den Ausbau von Einrichtungen zur Förderung von frühkindlicher Bildung verlangt und zu lebenslangem Lernen aufruft. Zugleich schlägt das Papier vor, die Tätigkeit in sozialen Diensten systematisch marktfähig zu machen und auf diese Weise Arbeitsmarktpotenziale zu erschließen. Zu den weiteren Forderungen der Ökonomen zählen die verstärkte Ausrichtung von Zuwanderung und Integration an den wirtschaftlichen Interessen Deutschlands, die Trennung von Umverteilung und Sozialversicherung im Steuer- und Transfersystem sowie die Schaffung von Anreizen zur Risikoübernahme innerhalb des wohlfahrtsstaatlichen Gefüges.