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This paper employs four cointegration test approaches, PO, HI, JJ and KSS, to test for pairwise long-run equilibrium relationships between Taiwan's stock price index and each of the stock price indexes of four European markets – French, German, Dutch, and British stock markets. The results from these four tests are robust and clearly consistent in suggesting that the Taiwan stock market is not pairwise cointegrated with the four European stock markets. This provides strong evidence that there exist long-run benefits for Taiwan investors diversifying in the equity markets of Taiwan's major European trading partners, France, Germany, Holland, and the UK, over the sample period considered from 6 January 1998 to 30 May 2002. These findings could be valuable to Taiwan individual investors and financial institutions holding long-run investment portfolios in the equity markets of France, Germany, Holland, and the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the relationship between size and growth for a sample of banks from France, Germany, Italy and the UK over the period 1990 to 1996. Using several measures of bank size (total assets, equity and value of off balance sheet business), we test for size effects on growth, using models which incorporate the influences of previous growth, bank type and country of origin. The results of the analysis suggest that for Italy, small banks tend to grow faster than larger banks. No relationship is found between bank size and growth for France, Germany and the UK. This suggests a process of increasing concentration in these banking systems, even in the absence of bank specific strategic advantages. Small banks tend to have more variable growth rates than their larger counterparts. This suggests that large banks may enjoy advantages associated with diversified operations, which make them less susceptible to periods of extremely high or low growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports results of an empirical study on the effectiveness of labour market policy. Data from Austria, France, Germany, Great Britain, Sweden and the United States are used to apply a simultaneous equation model with wages and employment being the endogenous variables. In order to explain employment, the amount of unemployment benefits per unemployed (passive labour market policy) and payment for wage subsidies and training per employed and unemployed person (active labour market policy) are used in addition to real wages and output. Wages and output have their expected impact on total employment. It turns out that passive labour market policy has a negative, and active labour market measures a positive, effect on the number of persons employed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the statistical technique of fuzzy clustering, regimes of inflation and unemployment are explored for the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany between 1871 and 2009. We identify for each country three distinct regimes in inflation/unemployment space. Similarities exist across countries in both the regimes and the timings of the transitions between regimes. However, the typical rates of inflation and unemployment experienced in the regimes are substantially different. Further, even within a given regime, the results from the cluster analysis reveal persistent fluctuations in the degree of attachment to that regime of inflation/unemployment observations over time. The economic implications of this are that, first, the inflation/unemployment relationship or Phillips curve experiences from time to time major shifts. Second, that it is also inherently unstable even in the short run. It is likely that the factors which govern the inflation/unemployment trade-off are so multi-dimensional that it is hard to identify periods of short-run Phillips curves which can be assigned to particular historical periods with any degree of accuracy or predictability. The analysis shows that reliance on a trade-off between inflation and unemployment for policy purposes is misplaced even in the short run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We employ an error correction model of leverage to test the trade-off and pecking order theories of capital structure for firms in the UK, France and Germany. The error correction framework extends the partial adjustment model by explicitly modelling changes in target leverage and past deviations from such target as determinants of firms' dynamic leverage adjustment process. We also augment our empirical models to test the pecking order theory. Using appropriate and advanced dynamic panel data methods, we find that UK, French and German firms adjust towards target leverage quickly in both the partial adjustment and error correction models, which is consistent with the trade-off theory. We further show that the trade-off theory explains these firms' capital structure decisions better than the pecking order theory in the models nesting the two theories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides insight on the relationship between individual obesity and happiness levels. Using the latest available panel data from Germany German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP), UK British Household Panel Survey (BHPS), and Australia Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA), we examine whether there is statistical evidence on the impact of overweight on subjective well-being. Instrumental Variable (IV) analysis is utilized under the presence of endogeneity, stemming from several explanatory variables. Results indicate that in all three countries obesity has a negative effect on the subjective well-being of individuals. The results also have important implications for the effect of other socio-demographic, economic and individual characteristics on well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of fiscal convergence in the EU is a relevant issue in the context of economic integration and fiscal harmonization and we report new empirical evidence on this topic using a time series approach. We apply unit root and stationarity tests with an endogenous break for the study of long run, deterministic and stochastic convergence of the national tax burden taking Germany, the United Kingdom and the European average as benchmarks. Only the United Kingdom and Germany show long run convergence and few countries converge despite harmonization efforts and fiscal competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Uncovered Interest Rate Parity (UIP) states that bonds in different denomination should produce the same returns if the maturities of the bonds are the same. Given this, if a foreign bond produces a lower holding period return than a home bond of the same maturity, for their remaining lives the same foreign bond ought to produce a return higher than the home bond. A test is designed according to this relationship. With 1 to 6 year interest rate data of U.S., Britain and Germany from 1979 to 2005, our test shows that this relationship is more reliable for 6-year interest rates than the shorter rates in general. This result lends support to the long-run UIP. A trading strategy is developed by utilizing this idea. We show that positive returns can be achieved by the strategy for bonds of longer horizons. This result also serves as indirect evidence of the long-run UIP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work examines the behaviour of the input and output measures of the R&D process in the United States, Germany, France and the United Kingdom, in the second half of the 20th century. The researcher and idea stock series can be construed as stationary fluctuations around a trend function, with a main breakpoint at the end of the 1960s. All the countries exhibit slower growth after their last breaks that during the decades preceding its first breaks. In this connection, the United States and Germany appear to represent the end points in the range of incidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effects of patents as indicators for innovations and standards on German trade performance are analysed in general and German–British trade in detail. The latter analysis goes a step further than the approach of Swann et al. (1996) and is based on a broader and more detailed database. The results show that Germany's export performance can primarily be explained by its innovative capacity and only to a small extent by its strength in standards. Furthermore, the results underscore the common view of the trade-fostering effect of international standards, while ‘idiosyncratic' standards have ambiguous effects on exports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic thought has often regarded business cycles as asymmetric. This study examines the existence of asymmetries over the business cycle in seven European countries: France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom. To analyse this issue, industrial production in these countries from 1957 to 1998 is examined, and quarterly contractions and expansions in this variable are compared. The results obtained with both parametric and non- parametric methods allow the existence of asymmetries in these countries to be questioned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]