Crisis

In a new IREF Working Paper, David Stadelmann (Bayreuth University and IREF) and his co-authors discuss how the corona epidemic can be made less burdensome. They focus on the role of those who are immune after recovering from the illness and do not pose any health risks to others. The authors point to corona immunity as a resource that should be searched, found, produced, certified, and finally employed to ease the way out of the lockdown.

While all of the former socialist economies have liberalised and strengthened their markets over the past two decades, they have failed to strengthen the rule of law (see Table 1). Under socialism, legal systems are not designed to protect the rights of individuals. Instead, they serve the interests of the political elite. To that end, judges, prosecutors, and other judicial officials are trained and expected to cater to those interests. Most worrisome, some of the former socialist economies have even seen the weakening of the rule of law in the last few years.

Despite plenty of terrifying predictions about populist coalition victory and its consequences, the latest European election provided a rather different outcome. No tsunami materialized, no earthquake. Nothing that would wipe-out…

It is common opinion that financial cycles generate business cycles and crises, and that central banks intervene to sterilise this causal link. But there are reasons to doubt both statements.

Paris has decided to recall its ambassador from Rome, further deepening one of the worst crises between the two neighbouring countries in recent European history. The dramatic (some say theatrical)…

In less than 25 years, the Italian political system has experienced three watershed elections, an unmatched record among most (if not all) Western European democracies. In 1994, the entire Italian…

If one wonders what Donald Trump, Marine Le Pen, Jeremy Corbyn and Matteo Salvini have in common, the answer is that each of them has been labelled populist, a word…

The Swiss National Bank (SNB) has recently published a record profit of staggering 54 bn. Franken or €46 bn. The central bank´s profit is equivalent to 6,600 Franken for every…

WP 2017-05.  Discussions on the optimal level of government intervention in the economy have become very intense in recent years, especially following the 2008 financial and economic crisis. The hardships…

Ten years on from the late summer collapse of first Paribas’ money market funds and then the failure of the UK’s Northern Rock bank, the media have published a raft…