Political turmoil and early elections in Bulgaria (by Rumen Dobrinsky; pp. 1-4) Keywords: Bulgaria, elections Countries covered: Bulgaria Topics: Other A revival of industrial policy as a growth model for Russia? (by Peter Havlik; pp. 5-6) Keywords: industrial policy, growth model Countries covered: Russia Topics: Macroeconomic Analysis and Policy; International Trade, Competitiveness and FDI The determinants of income polarization at the household and country level across the EU (by Mario Holzner; pp. 7-10) Keywords: income polarization, fiscal policy Countries cove...more

The new Multiannual Financial Framework of the European Union for 2014-2020: a comment (by Sándor Richter; pp. 1-3) Keywords: financial framework Countries covered: EU Topics: Macroeconomic Analysis and Policy Labour costs, external competitiveness and economic growth in new EU member states (by Vasily Astrov; pp. 4-11) Keywords: labour costs, competitiveness, inflation Countries covered: NMS Topics: Macroeconomic Analysis and Policy, International Trade, Competitiveness and FDI Global values – new reflections and new data on an old debate (by Arno Tausch; pp. 12-18...more

Innovation is considered to be an important determinant of performance at the firm, industry and country level. This view is supported by empirical evidence showing the importance of innovative activities on firm and industry performance and country growth rates. The majority of the world’s R&D is concentrated in a handful of countries however, meaning that domestic innovation is of little importance for most countries. Such countries can benefit from innovation conducted elsewhere however, if knowledge and technology is diffused across borders. In this paper we survey existing literature on innovation and technology diffusion and discuss descriptive statistics on the extent of innovation and technology diffusion across countries to provide insights into the likely developments in innovation and diffusion....more

During economic downturns, labour hoarding becomes an attractive human resource strategy if sizeable search and training costs render hiring and training new workers too costly. The paper sheds light on the prevalence and extent of labour hoarding in five New EU Member States and Turkey during the global financial crisis, which spread quickly like wildfire after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers in September 2008. It applies a unique firm-level panel, constructed by merging the World Bank Financial Crisis Survey (FCS) with the Business Environment and Enterprise Performance survey (BEEPs) and ...more

Fiscal constraint is potentially lax in catching-up economies, but it has not been abused by most countries considered in this paper. Fiscal risks are significant currently, but sustainability and structural balances are not threatened as a rule, if the return to potential growth rates is to be achieved in the medium run. The risks to countercyclical public financing could be discouraged by a comprehensive EU stabilization policy of some sort. Early euro adoption, absent credible stabilization policy, is not the first best policy option for fiscal policy targets....more

MENA in transition: any lessons from CESEE? (by Peter Havlik and Sándor Richter; pp. 1-7) Keywords: MENA, transition Countries covered: MENA, CESEE Topics: Other The EU and Russia: both important for Ukraine (by Vasily Astrov; pp. 8-9) Keywords: Ukraine, trade association, Russia, EU Countries covered: Ukraine, Russia, EU Topics: International Trade, Competitiveness and FDI; Other What price nationalism? Economic consequences of the break-up of Yugoslavia (by Vladimir Gligorov; pp. 10-13) Keywords: Yugoslavia break-up, post-Yugoslav countries Countries covered: Slovenia, Croati...more

Supply-demand imbalanced drive food prices (by Zdenek Lukas; pp. 1-6) Keywords: agricultural production, food supply and demand, food prices, inflation Countries covered: EU, New EU Member States Topics: Sectoral studies; Macroeconomic Analysis and Policy The gas and electricity sectors of the Western Balkan countries (by Vasily Astrov and Doris Hanzl-Weiss; pp. 7-12) Keywords: electricity sector, gas sector Countries covered: SEE Topics: Sectoral Studies; Regional Development Recent problems with private pension funds in Poland (by Lech Keller-Krawczyk; pp. 13-16) Keywords: pe...more

Romanian SMEs can directly benefit from the Sectoral Operational Programme ‘Increase of Economic Competitiveness’ (SOP IEC) and some parts of the Regional Operational Programme (ROP) in the period 2007 2013. Research commissioned by the Directorate General for Regional Policy of the European Commission made a strategic evaluation of SMEs’ experience with these support programmes and their needs for support in general. This paper is the summary of the final report of the project carried out in the first half of 2010. In the context of the research underlying this paper, a standardized sur...more

European Comparison Project data (years 1999-2008) are used for an estimation of cross-country systems (AIDS) of consumer demand functions defined over durable and non-durable tradable goods and non-tradable services. General exchange equilibrium models of inter-EU trade generate equalized relative prices of tradable goods. But domestic relative prices of services become more dispersed and can move the PPP/ER ratios away from unity. PPP/ER discrepancies may be sustained even when there are no impediments to free trade. ...more