Marco Buti - Böcker

Over the past decade European economic integration has seen considerable institutional success, but the economic performance of the EU has been varied. While macroeconomic stability has improved and an emphasis on cohesion preserved, the EU economic system has not delivered satisfactory growth performance.This book is the report of a high-level group commissioned by the President of the European Commission to review the EU economic system and propose a blueprint for an economic system capable of delivering faster growth along with stability and cohesion. It assesses the EU s economic performance, examines the challenges facing the EU in the coming years, and presents a series of recommendations.The report views Europe's unsatisfactory growth performance during the last decades as a symptom of its failure to transform into an innovation-based economy. It has now become clear that the context in which economic policies have been developed has changed fundamentally over the past thirty years. A system built around the assimilation of existing technologies, mass production generating economics of scale, and an industrial structure dominated by large firms with stable markets and long term employment patterns no longer delivers in the world of today, characterized by economic globalization and strong external competition. What is needed now is more opportunity for new entrants, greater mobility of employees within and across firms, more retraining, greater reliance on market financing, and higher investment in both R&D and higher education. This requires a massive and urgent change in economic policies in Europe.

Over the past decade European economic integration has seen considerable institutional success, but the economic performance of the EU has been varied. While macroeconomic stability has improved and an emphasis on cohesion preserved, the EU economic system has not delivered satisfactory growth performance.This book is the report of a high-level group commissioned by the President of the European Commission to review the EU economic system and propose a blueprint for an economic system capable of delivering faster growth along with stability and cohesion. It assesses the EU s economic performance, examines the challenges facing the EU in the coming years, and presents a series of recommendations.The report views Europe's unsatisfactory growth performance during the last decades as a symptom of its failure to transform into an innovation-based economy. It has now become clear that the context in which economic policies have been developed has changed fundamentally over the past thirty years. A system built around the assimilation of existing technologies, mass production generating economics of scale, and an industrial structure dominated by large firms with stable markets and long term employment patterns no longer delivers in the world of today, characterized by economic globalization and strong external competition. What is needed now is more opportunity for new entrants, greater mobility of employees within and across firms, more retraining, greater reliance on market financing, and higher investment in both R&D and higher education. This requires a massive and urgent change in economic policies in Europe.

Europe's Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) is unlike any other case of monetary unification in history. Here, sovereign countries retain a large degree of fiscal autonomy while monetary policy is centralised and entrusted to an independent central bank - the European Central Bank - with a clear mandate to preserve price stability. By bringing together leading scholars and policy makers this comprehensive book examines and reviews the challenges that are facing economic policies in the EMU today. Blending theoretical and policy analyses, the chapters explore and examine the co-ordination of macroeconomic policies to EMU's fiscal policy rules in view of EU enlargement; the interplay between supply side reforms and stabilisation policy; the empirics of monetary and fiscal behaviour; policy making under uncertainty and the international dimension of policy spillovers. This fascinating book contributes to a deeper understanding of policy interactions in EMU, opening up new avenues for economic research and policy analysis.

This book analyses the main problems in the functioning of the welfare state and possible actions for its reform. Focusing on the European Union, it looks at the achievements of and challenges to the welfare state as we enter the 21st century.The authors consider the general problem of redistribution and how to make it more efficient, by reducing huge benefits and tax disincentives that individuals encounter in different life periods or life choices. In addition, they analyse issues such as:economic effects of the welfare statemechanisms for improving incentives in the welfare stateimplications of Economic and Monetary Union for the welfare stateoptions in pension fundingimpact of ageing on the pensions systems in the European Union

This book analyses the impact of European tax and benefit systems on incentives to create and take up jobs. European policymakers face tough choices as reforms to these systems are costly and recognising and understanding the complex trade-offs involved - a pre-condition to pushing the reform process forward - is the aim of this volume.The authors, experts in public and welfare economics, investigate the problems involved in re-designing tax and benefit systems in Europe, the cross-country spillovers of 'bad' domestic policies and the peer pressure from closer policy co-operation in EMU. They examine reforms in tax and welfare systems and suggest ways in which to improve their efficiency without undermining the equitable foundations of the European social model. While aiming at a high degree of generality, the analyses are rooted firmly in the experience of European countries and the conclusions are therefore all the more relevant and of interest to policymakers in Europe, as well as the rest of the world.The blend of theoretical and institutional analysis, policy suggestions and case studies of relevant European success stories will ensure this book appeals to policymakers and scholars of welfare, European and labour studies.

EMU is a completely new policy regime which has significant economic implications and which, it is hoped, will ultimately enhance the role of Europe on the world stage. EMU and Economic Policy in Europe takes stock of the initial experiences of EMU and assesses the challenges which will have to be addressed in the early years of its existence to ensure its long-term objectives are successfully achieved.Bringing together leading scholars and policymakers, the book considers some of the most pertinent and significant issues surrounding the euro from a variety of different perspectives. These include the behaviour of monetary and fiscal authorities, the implications for policy co-ordination, the impact of the euro on financial markets and the consequences of EU enlargement.The distinguished array of authors have produced a comprehensive and balanced assessment of the initial economic and policy challenges facing EMU. European policymakers, financial economists and anyone with an interest in the process of European integration will benefit from reading this accomplished book.

This book explores the origins, rationale, problems and prospects of the European fiscal policy framework. It provides the reader with a roadmap to EMU's budgetary framework by exploring its theoretical and empirical foundations, uncovering its historical roots and emphasising its supranational nature.The authors, who have been at the forefront of the academic and policy debate on economic policy in Europe, argue that fiscal policy has always been at the core of the EMU debate. The Maastricht criteria and the Stability and Growth Pact are the most contentious building blocks of EMU's institutional architecture: they have aroused heated controversies between academics and policymakers ever since their adoption. As EMU's budgetary rules undergo their first severe shock, Europe is still searching for its fiscal soul. The book's basic premise is that one cannot fully understand EMU's fiscal framework and the recent debate on its reform without placing them in a historical and institutional perspective and abstracting from the uniqueness of EMU, where sovereign countries retain a large degree of fiscal independence, and monetary policy is entrusted to an independent central bank with the overriding mission of maintaining price stability.Analysing all aspects of EMU's fiscal rules and institutions, this book will strongly appeal to students, academics and researchers of macroeconomic policy and European integration. Policymakers and fiscal policy experts at both national and international levels will also find the book to be of great interest.