The enlargement of the European Monetary Union is likely to lead to an increase of uncertainty about the transmission of monetary policy for the larger union. Adding new members to the central bank council will in addition imply that the preferences of the enlarged council will be uncertain in...

In this paper we find evidence that the new economic geography approach is able to describe and explain the spatial characteristics of an economy, in our case the German economy. Using German district data we estimate the structural parameters of a new economic geography model as developed by...

The standard literature on working time has modelled the decisions of firms in a deterministic framework in which firms can choose between employment and overtime (given mandated standard hours). Contrary to this approach, we follow the real options approach, which allows us to investigate the...

Can process conditionality really enhance poverty reduction in developing countries? This question is addressed in the framework of a politico-economic model considering political distortions both on the recipient and on the donor side. It turns out that process conditionality is a very useful...

Variations of bilateral aid flows are difficult to explain on the basis of official development objectives or recipient need. At the example of US aid to Pakistan, this paper suggests alternative political economic explanations, notably the relevance of ethnic lobbying and the relevance of US...

Border regions and border effects currently attract a lot of attention in political practice and economic research. Substantial interest in regions located along the frontiers of integrating countries is predominantly inspired by the presumption that their specific geographic position might...