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While most economists agree that seigniorage is one way governments finance deficits, there is less agreement about the political, institutional and economic reasons for relying on it. This paper investigates the main political and institutional determinants of seigniorage using panel data on about 100 countries, for the period 1960–1999. Estimates show that greater political instability leads to higher seigniorage, especially in developing, less democratic and socially-polarized countries, with high inflation, low access to domestic and external debt financing and with higher turnover of central bank presidents. One important policy implication of this study is the need to develop institutions conducive to greater political stability as a means to reduce the reliance on seigniorage financing of public deficits. ; The authors acknowledge the helpful comments from Christopher Bowdler, Juan Jauregui, Delfim Neto, Carlos Végh, Robert Flood, Paolo Mauro, various staff members from the International Monetary Fund, two anonymous referees, and the editor, Lant Pritchett. We also thank Reid Click for sharing his data on creditworthiness ratings. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF or IMF policy. Francisco Veiga wishes to thank the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) for research grant POCI/EGE/55423/2004 (partially funded by ...

This paper studies stabilisation policies in a multi-country currency union of small open economies. It abstracts from key factors favouring currency union formation, such as reduced transaction costs and enhanced credibility, which are exogenous to the factors studied here. Demand-side shocks hamper monetary union stabilisation unless members face identical output-inflation tradeoffs and their business cycles are perfectly synchronised. Under supply shocks, welfare implications from joining a currency union are less clear cut. In particular, when these shocks are common across participating countries a tradeoff arises whereby the latter benefit if they are relatively open but are at a disadvantage in case they are of small size. Monetary-fiscal interaction leads to a free rider problem, with area-wide supply shocks eliciting higher interest rate variability. Compared with the case of real wage rigidity, increased real wage flexibility mitigates the free rider problem. Higher trade union decentralisation overall favours a currency union. The present multi-country currency union setup should not be seen as an attempt at settling the sharp differences that exist in the literature. Our model could be modified in order to derive results that are valid in more realistic environments. These include the analysis of public debt considerations in the case of fiscal policies, and both institutional and (further) macroeconomic aspects in the area of wage determination.

By 2040, the United States will no longer be considered as a global superpower and the world may be headed toward a long era devoid of any superpowers. This will occur as a result of several negative trends within the United States itself, combined with changing dynamics and exigencies in the global system and the rise of more powerful competitors in Asia and Europe. The negative trends within the United States include unprecedented governmental and international debt, dysfunctional campaign-finance and lobbying systems, unmanageable entitlement and health-care obligations, a deteriorating public education network, an inordinate concentration of wealth and power in the hands of relatively few individuals and corporate interests, and imperial overstretch. Internationally, globalization trends will necessitate much more cooperation across national borders with a premium placed on multilateral cooperation as opposed to unilateral initiatives. More than one-third of humanity in China and India is now being integrated into the international market system and new national and regional competitors such as the EU and ASEAN will diminish the overall economic and political influence of the United States. In 2040, the United States may be primus inter pares among the leading group of nations, but both the ``American Century" and America's ``unipolar moment" in history will have come to an end.

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "District officials have recently reported both a budget gap and a more permanent structural imbalance between costs and revenue raising capacity. They maintain that the structural imbalance largely stems from the federal government's presence and restrictions on the District's tax base. Accordingly, at various times District officials have asked the Congress for additional funds and other measures to enhance revenues. In a preliminary September 2002 report, GAO concluded that the District had not provided sufficient data and analysis to discern whether, or to what extent, it is facing a structural imbalance. At that time, GAO also agreed to perform a more comprehensive analysis and was asked to (1) determine whether, or to what extent, the District faces a structural imbalance between its revenue capacity and its public service responsibilities, (2) identify any significant constraints on the District's revenue capacity, (3) discuss factors beyond the control of District officials that influence the District's spending in key program areas as well as factors within its control, such as management problems, and (4) report on the District's deferred infrastructure projects and outstanding debt service and related expenses that might be affected by a structural imbalance. The District concurred with our key findings."

Siguiendo la evolución de los conceptos económicos básicos del político e intelectual asturiano sobre la propiedad y sus límites, sobre los arrendamientos rústicos, sobre la política tributaria y sobre la deuda pública, se analizan aquí las propuestas que Flórez Estrada presentó como alternativa a la legislación desamortizadora de Mendizábal. Su planteamiento presenta aspectos muy discutibles como la fórmula de asignación de tierras en enfiteusis, la determinación de los beneficiarios y el procedimiento para la ejecución de todo el plan. Los puntos débiles del proyecto fueron la causa de que, ya en su tiempo, dicho plan se considerara desde las filas liberales menos viable y eficaz que el de Mendizábal.Abstract: Going on the basic economical aims of political and intellectual "asturiano" about the private property and its limits, the rustic lettings, the pay policy and public debt, Flórez Estrada proposals, introduced as the alternative to Mendizábal´s desamortizadora legislation, are analysed hear. His posement shows very discussable aspects such as: the way for the asignation of land in enfiteusis, the determinatio of the beneficiaries and the procedure for the whole plan ejecution. The weak points of the project caused that, already the, that plan was considered from the liberal files less achievable and effective that Mendizábal´s law.

'An Homage to German Law'. English legal historians sometimes claim that English law has developed 'in splendid isolation' from the rest of Europe. Modern English contract lawyers often fail to stress the historical links that English law developed in the 19th century with Roman, French and, especially, German law. Among contemporary lawyers, academic and practising, there exists a wide spread misinformation about contemporary European law - private as well as public. This brief essay attempts to redress the balance by arguing that English contract law owes a great intellectual debt to German thought. In its second part, which the author hopes to expand one day into an independent piece, the question is asked why are some modern English scholars, unlike their nineteenth century counterparts, so determined to underplay these links? Is it because they believe that German law no longer has anything to offer to the English? Or is it because the English, in their current state of weakened self-confidence, are reluctant to concede to their economic 'competitors' even the slightest point of scholarly superiority? Whatever the reasons, in the author's view, understanding the many fruitful links that once existed between the two systems can only help the process of greater co-operation and, even legal harmonisation in Europe which he has always favoured.

The proposed New International Economic Order (NIEO) supported by many nations has been defended not as charity, but rather, as repayment of the debts of prosperous nations to impoverished ones. Whether Western prosperity is based on exploitation of non-Western nations appears questionable, since those nations with closest trading relations with Western nations are also generally most prosperous. Explanations for low prosperity can be found partly in the lack of trade, partly in the lack of public willingness to take up or seek economic activities in some nations, & partly in the policies of Third World governments, including discrimination against successful minorities & forcible economic collectivization. The concept of `the Third World' as economically homogeneous is, in fact, misleading, especially since statistics from the countries it includes show great diversity & can be expected to have little relation to actualities in any case. Foreign aid represents a transfer of capital to peoples who cannot use it efficiently, & still worse, to governments which use it to gain greater control over their populations, through a variety of authoritarian measures. Many proposed measures, eg, commodity price supports, would, in fact, benefit fairly well-off nations at the expense of truly poor ones. The NIEO could only be maintained through worldwide authoritarian government for an indefinite period. W. H. Stoddard.

Austruy, Jacques. Le Scandale du DéveloppementBalassa, Bela A. Trade Prospects for Developing CountriesBohm, Peter. External Economies in ProductionBosch, Werner. VermögensstreuungBusch‐Lüty, Christiane. Gesamtwirtschaftliche LohnpolitikClausen, Lars. Elemente einer Soziologie der WirtschaftswerbungDabin, Jean. Der Staat oder Untersuchungen über das PolitischeDoyle, Leonard A. Inter‐Economy Comparisons: A Case StudyGoldberger, Arthur S. Econometric Theory.Gutmann, Gernot. Theorie und Praxis der monetären Planung in der ZentralverwaltungswirtschaftHahn, L. Albert. Ein Traktat über Währungsreform.Harbison, Frederick, and Myers, Charles A. Manpower and EducationJoshi, L. A. The Control of Industry in IndiaLaursen, Karsten, and Pedersen, JØrgen. The German Inflation 1918‐23Lester, Richard A. (Ed.). Labor: Reading on Major Issues.Linhardt, Hanns. Kritik der Währungs‐ und Bankpolitik.Liu, Ta‐Chung, and Yeh, Kung‐Chia. The Economy of the Chinese Mainland: National Income and Economic DevelopmentMachlup, Fritz. International Payments, Debts, and GoldNeumark, S. Daniel. Foreign Trade and Economic Development in Africa: A Historical PerspectiveOlson Jr., Mancur. The Logic of Collective ActionPross, Helge. Manager und Aktionäre in DeutschlandRedlich, Fritz. The German Military Enterpriser and His Work ForceSachs, Ignacy. Patterns of Public Sector in Under‐developed Economies.Schultz, Theodore W. Economic Crises in World Agriculture.Stohler, Jacques. Die Integration des VerkehrsTheil, H., in association with van DEN Bogaard, P. J. M. Optimal Decision Rules for Government and IndustryVajda, S. Mathematical Programming.Vibe‐Pedersen, John. National Income and Aggregate Income Distributionvon PÁsztory, Tibor. Von marxistischer Ideologie zur PlanwirtschaftWirth, Louis. On Cities and Social LifeZsoldos, Laszlo. The Economic Integration of Hungary into the Soviet Bloc: Foreign Trade Experience

This Technical Note was prepared in the context of a joint World Bank-IMF Financial Sector Assessment Program mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina during October-November 2014. Bosnia's capital markets are currently small, but they have the potential to play a more important role in the country's future.

A bedrock American principle is the idea that all individuals should have the opportunity to succeed on the basis of their own effort, skill, and ingenuity.—Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke Income inequality has been on the rise since the late 1970s, but the economic and financial crisis of 2008 instigated an unemployment epidemic that dramatically compounded this problem in the United States and catapulted the issue to the center of debate. There is wide agreement across the political spectrum that high inequality is contributing to undesirable circumstances such as stagnant household income, rising poverty rates, and increased borrowing and debt, though there is much less agreement on remedies. Inequality in America provides a snapshot of the issues posed by the growing concentrations of income, focusing on the United States but drawing on international comparisons to help set the context. The authors examine the economic, technological, and political drivers of inequality and identify worrying trends associated with its rise. They demonstrate how specific factors have exacerbated income inequality, including technological change, international trade, changes in labor market participation, and the increasing role of the financial sector. Their clear and concise exposition makes the issues surrounding income distribution accessible to a wider public. As they write in the conclusion: "We have argued that tackling the worst effects of inequality and re-establishing a measure of equal opportunity requires increased investment in crucial public goods: first, education; second, a more progressive and simplified tax system; and third, increased international cooperation to avoid a race to the bottom. Education, tax, and other such policies are pursued by other highperforming advanced countries and can be shaped for the United States in a way that

"One of the main economic villains before the crisis was the presence of large "global imbalances." The concern was that the U.S. would experience a sudden stop of capital flows, which would unavoidably drag the world economy into a deep recession. However, when the crisis finally did come, the mechanism did not at all resemble the feared sudden stop. Quite the opposite, during the crisis net capital inflows to the U.S. were a stabilizing rather than a destabilizing source. I argue instead that the root imbalance was of a different kind: The entire world had an insatiable demand for safe debt instruments that put an enormous pressure on the U.S. financial system and its incentives (and this was facilitated by regulatory mistakes). The crisis itself was the result of the negative feedback loop between the initial tremors in the financial industry created to bridge the safe-assets gap and the panic associated with the chaotic unraveling of this complex industry. Essentially, the financial sector was able to create "safe" assets from the securitization of lower quality ones, but at the cost of exposing the economy to a systemic panic. This structural problem can be alleviated if governments around the world explicitly absorb a larger share of the systemic risk. The options for doing this range from surplus countries rebalancing their portfolios toward riskier assets, to private-public solutions where asset-producer countries preserve the good parts of the securitization industry while removing the systemic risk from the banks' balance sheets. Such public-private solutions could be designed with fee structures that could incorporate all kind of too-big- or too-interconnected-to-fail considerations"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site

In The Decline of the Welfare State, Assaf Razin and Efraim Sadka use a political economy framework to analyze the effects of aging populations, migration, and globalization on the deteriorating system of financing welfare state benefits as we know them. Their timely analysis, supported by a unified theoretical framework and empirical findings, demonstrates how the combined forces of demographic change and globalization will make it impossible for the welfare state to maintain itself on its present scale. - In much of the developed world, the proportion of the population aged 60 and over is expected to rise dramatically over the coming years — from 35 percent in 2000 to a projected 66 percent in 2050 in the European Union and from 27 percent to 47 percent in the United States — which may necessitate higher tax burdens and greater public debt to maintain national pension systems at current levels. Low-skill migration produces additional strains on welfare-state financing because such migrants typically receive benefits that exceed what they pay in taxes. Higher capital taxation, which could potentially be used to finance welfare benefits, is made unlikely by international tax competition brought about by globalization of the capital market. Applying a political economy model and drawing on empirical data from the EU and the United States, the authors draw an unconventional and provocative conclusion from these developments. They argue that the political pressure from both aging and migrant populations indirectly generates political processes that favor trimming rather than expanding the welfare state. The combined pressures of aging, migration, and globalization will shift the balance of political power and generate public support from the majority of the voting population for cutting back traditional welfare state benefits.

Since 2008-09, the European Union (EU) experienced two major economic crises revealing all the flaws of the existing model of economic governance. By leaving the majority of the countries with high levels of deficit and public debt, the two crises have shown that the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) is indeed an unfinished project where the monetary union alone is not sufficient to safeguard the entire EU economy. To strengthen the EMU and to mitigate future risks that could possibly lead to the collapse of the euro-area, many called for a deeper fiscal integration by creating a central fiscal capacity for the EMU or, in other words, a fiscal union. Due to the present political unfeasibility of such an endeavour, however, concrete steps towards a European Fiscal Union (EFU) have been modest and the revised Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) remains its core building block. As the Pact defines supranational and shapes the creation of national fiscal rules, maintaining its credibility continues to be vital. This article analyses the effects of the fiscal rules on the public finances of the member states. It is assumed that by adhering to the supranational and adopting quality domestic fiscal rules, the member states are better equipped in remaining fiscally prudent, thus also affirming the revamped SGP as a solid base for the furthering of the EFU. The two-track evaluation approach defines dynamic panels for the EFU as a whole and for the selected country groups. It finds certain benevolent effects on budgetary performance at the EFU level, as well as for the countries with higher quality of the fiscal rules.

Based on the ZHAW Managers Survey (7-13 April 2020) we evaluate firm reactions towards the COVID-19 crisis. We find that the Swiss economic lockdown measures successfully froze the economy, i.e., firms show very little pro-active reactions towards the crisis, but drastically decrease their business activities. The firms in the survey report that the decline in foreign demand is the single most important reasons for their deteriorating business situation. The only significant pro-active reactions to mitigate the crisis are increased digitalization efforts. These efforts are expected to have a long-lasting impact on firms' performance due to a selection effect, i.e., firms with more positive experience of digitialization will maintain their higher levels of digitalization even after the crisis. In general we find that firms that faced a more difficult business situation before the crisis are affected more severely during the crisis. Moreover, we investigate the impact of the Swiss federal loan program (Bundeshilfe) on the business activities of Swiss firms. Specifically, we focus on the take up of firms and its interaction with the perceived business situation before and during the COVID-19 crisis. To this end, we develop a stylized theoretical model of financially constrained heterogeneous firms. We find that policy makers face a trade-off between immediate higher unemployment rates and long-term higher public spending. The former arises from a combination of a too strong economic impact of the COVID-19 lockdown and too low levels of loans provided by the government to financially distressed firms. Nevertheless, providing (too) high levels of loans to firms might create zombie firms that are going to default on their debt in the future leading to an increase in public spending.

Summary: Economics calls no morals or ethics. It claims to be science and it affirms that the proper functioning of individual interest constitutes the best economic and social solution for all economic agents. Any measure aimed at modifying the relentless and fair game of the market leads to perverse effects, such as unemployment, public debt or capital transfers, which will strain the future horizons of collective well-being. In this context, economic globalization constitutes major social progress. Heterodox economists question this sketchy concept of man. Concretely, the deviations from hypotheses compared to reality are numerous, such as the existence of competitive monopolies or oligopolies, the necessary political, strategic and sovereign interventions of the States, economic crises, growing inequalities, all the problems collective pollution and the excessive exploitation of the Earth that the particular economic interests can easily neglect to the detriment of the world community. ; Résumé : La science économique n'appelle aucune morale ou éthique. Elle se veut science et elle affirme que le bon fonctionnement de l'intérêt individuel constitue la meilleure solution économique et sociale pour l'ensemble des agents économiques. Toute mesure tendant à modifier le jeu implacable et juste du marché conduit à des effets pervers, comme le chômage, l'endettement public ou les transferts de capitaux, qui grèveront les futurs horizons du bien-être collectif. Dans ce contexte, la globalisation économique constitue un progrès social majeur. Les économistes hétérodoxes s'interrogent sur cette conception sommaire de l'homme. Concrètement, les entorses des hypothèses par rapport à la réalité sont nombreuses, comme l'existence de monopoles ou d'oligopoles concurrentiels, les interventions politiques, stratégiques et régaliennes nécessaires des Etats, les crises économiques, les inégalités croissantes, l'ensemble des problèmes de pollution collective, notamment le réchauffement climatique, et l'exploitation excessive de ...