Past 2021 Events
Reassessing the EU Fiscal and Monetary Framework after COVID-19
Organizers: Pierre Werner Chair (RSCAS, EUI), European Stability Mechanism, Université du Luxembourg, CEPR
Date: 1-2 December 2021. Location: online
The fiscal response to the pandemic has been unprecedented, both at the national and European level, with Next Generation EU being a welcome path-breaking coordinated EU response to the Covid-19 crisis. NGEU is a temporary programme with long-term commitments (debts and reforms) addressing challenges which will not disappear with Covid, while the list of post-Covid challenges is longer: a still fractioned single market, growth in an ageing society, inequality across and within EU countries, global political instability, etc. NGEU will shape the European institutional setting in the longer-term, which raises the question: how it should be to efficiently address all these challenges?
The CEPR Research Policy Network on European Economic Architecture, started in September 2018 with a three-year horizon. It has been actively contributing since the start and through the crisis to the discussion and also shaped the idea of a recovery fund. Three years later is a good time to take stoke and reassess – together with other leading researchers and professionals from academia and fiscal and monetary institutions – the after-Covid-19-crisis EU, and euro area, fiscal and monetary policy and institutional framework.
Organising Committee
- Jan Pieter Krahnen (SAFE, Goethe University Frankfurt and CEPR)
- Ramon Marimon (European University Institute, UPF – BSE and CEPR)
- Philippe Martin (Sciences Po, French Council of Economic Analysis and CEPR)
- Jean Pisani-Ferry (EUI, Bruegel, Peterson Institute and CEPR)
- Rolf Strauch (European Stability Mechanism)
- Beatrice Weder Di Mauro (Graduate Institute Geneva, INSEAD Singapore and CEPR)
The interaction of Monetary and Fiscal Policies and institutions: Central Banks and Treasuries
Banque de France – EUI mini-conference
Date: 7 October 2021, 17:00 – 20:00 (CET). Format: hybrid
With developed countries’ sovereign debt levels at an historical high and interest rates still in the shadow of the effective lower-bound, the full recovery from the Covid-19 crisis requires a right mix of monetary and fiscal stimulus and stabilisation policies. Therefore, it requires effective institutional interaction between central banks and treasuries. Even in the U.S., with a long historical collaboration between the Federal Reserve Bank and the U.S. Treasury, this interaction is under scrutiny, as the dividing line, between monetary liabilities (dollars and bank reserves) and sovereign debt (Treasuries), is becoming fuzzier, and the fiscal nature and impact of monetary (QE) policies is becoming more apparent. In Europe there is no common EU Treasury. Nevertheless, the Eurosystem now holds almost 30% of the sovereign debt of the euro area Member States and, with Next Generation EU (NGEU), the European Commission can lend up to 800bn to EU Member States, mostly issuing Eurobonds, becoming a temporary Treasury-like counterpart of the ECB for the euro area. This scenario opens a debate on how monetary and fiscal policies and institutions should interact. The goal of this mini-conference is to contribute to it from the perspectives of economic theory and policy.
5th Edition: Workshop on A Dynamic Economic and Monetary Union
Workshop at the Barcelona GSE Summer Forum
Date: 16-17 June 2021
The 5th ADEMU Workshop is sponsored by the Pierre Werner Chair of the European University Institute and the European Stability Mechanism.
The ADEMU Workshop is part of the Barcelona GSE Summer Forum since 2017. The postponed 4th edition was one of the events celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Pierre Werner Report, Luxembourg, October 8-9, 2020.
Lecture by John H. Cochrane (Stanford University)
EUI Economics and Pierre Werner Chair Lecture
Date: 13 May 2021
Professor Cochrane gave a brief overview of the Fiscal Theory of the Price Level, based on the book draft by the same name. The fiscal theory states that money is valued because the government stands ready to soak up money with taxes. It provides an alternative foundation to standard monetarism or new-Keynesian models based on interest rate targets. During this seminar Professor Cochrane develops the basic idea, show how to apply it, and how to adapt standard models to fiscal theory. The audience is then guided through the data, understanding the roots of inflation, and the zero bound episode.
Social Security Reforms in Europe
Online mini-conference EUI-PWC and Banco de España
Date: 8 April 2021, 16:00 – 19:00 (CET)
The on-line mini-conference, jointly organized by the Pierre Werner Chair of the European University Institute (RSCAS) and the Banco de España, will focus on social security reforms that can help to prevent this next crisis. In the first part, three research papers will be presented and discussed that focus on the design and financial aspects, as well as an overall alternative to the PAYG system. This (Backpack) alternative is the starting point of the second part in which a panel will discuss challenges and reforms of European PAYG systems.
Rethinking the Welfare State: Lecture by Nezih Guner (CEMFI)
EUI Economics and Pierre Werner Chair Lecture
Date: 17 March 2021, 11:00 – 12:15 (CET)
The US spends about 2.5% of its GDP on non-medical, non-retirement means-tested transfers. These transfers, which cover a wide range of programs, provide income support for low and middle-income households. Can the U.S. economy do better? Is it possible to find welfare-improving ways to support households that are supported by a majority? The presentation answers these questions in a general equilibrium heterogeneous-agents model with single and married households facing idiosyncratic labor market productivity risk.
Co- authors: Remzi Kaygusuz (Sabanci University) and Gustavo Ventura (Arizona State University)
EUI Pierre Werner Chair webinar
Date: 3 March 2021, 2:00 – 3:30 PM (CET)
The notion of the monetary-fiscal policy mix has made a spectacular comeback as countries have been forced to takle the devastating economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. The 23rd Geneva Report on the World Economy stresses that the desirable coordination between central banks and treasuries can only work if the credibility of their commitment to desirable long-term goals – healthy growth under price stability and public debt sustainability – is preserved and backed by a resilient institutional framework, and urges policymakers to develop a strategy aimed at regaining policy space on both sides of the mix. (download the full report on VoxEu.org).
Chair:
- Ramon Marimon (Pierre Werner Chair and Professor of Economics, EUI)
Speakers (and authors of the report):
- Elga Bartsch (Head of Macro Research, BlackRock Investment Institute)
- Agnès Bénassy-Quéré (Professor, Paris School of Economics – University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)
- Giancarlo Corsetti (Professor of Macroeconomics, University of Cambridge)
- Xavier Debrun (Advisor, Research Department, National Bank of Belgium)
Panelists:
- Catherine L. Mann (Global Chief Economist,CitiBank)
- Ricardo Reis (Professor of Economics, LSE)
- Guntram Wolff (Director, Bruegel)