Blog Post
Adjustments to growth forecasts mean some countries will get 10% more than expected and others 20% less in grants from the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility. But the benefits of more quickly rising growth rates dwarf foregone recovery funds.
Blog Post
With Fit for 55, Europe is the global first mover in turning a long-term net-zero goal into real-world policies, marking the entry of climate policy into the daily life of all citizens and businesses.
Past Event
The EU will become into a major issuer of safe assets in the coming years. How will this interact with the debt issuance of European sovereign debts?
Policy Contribution
The European Union’s capital markets remain very underdeveloped compared to the United States. The market for equity, as measured as the size of the total market capitalisation of listed domestic firms relative to GDP, is much larger in the US and in Japan than in Europe.
Past Event
EU Commissioner for Jobs and Social Rights Nicolas Schmit joins Bruegel for a conversation around the future of work.
Blog Post
Plans for spending European Union recovery funds submitted by the four largest EU countries reflect rather different priorities. So far, only Italy is interested in borrowing from the EU.
Opinion
What makes one vision more desirable than another is not its neutrality, but whether it can better serve one’s goals in the context of where those goals are being pursued.
Opinion
Europe is often a ship with multiple captains. The boat moves forward in calm seas, but when the slightest wind puts it off course, it is not easy to steer that boat. It is not so much a question of more Europe rather than less, but of achieving ‘one Europe’. A ‘more-or-less Europe’ is an invitation to go nowhere.
Blog Post
The European Union’s purchases of frontrunner coronavirus vaccines are insufficient for the population’s near-term needs. The shortfall could have healthcare consequences and might delay economic reopening. Lessons should be learned for future pandemics.
Blog Post
The 2020 pandemic economic shock has led to reassessment of fiscal policy measures in 2018 and earlier, because of faulty measurement of unobserved output gaps and structural balances. The current period of suspension of EU fiscal rules should be used to design a better fiscal framework.
Blog Post
The plan to fund the European Union’s recovery programme via debt issuance has raised hopes that a new type of euro-denominated safe asset could emerge. As a priority, the European Commission needs a strategy to create a liquid and transparent market in EU bonds. For now, funding through EU green bonds would complicate that effort.
Opinion
The two narratives briefly examined here cast light on different aspects of the EU in the times of Covid-19. Euroskeptic nationalists typically propagate claims of EU failure but have been rather subdued during the pandemic as mainstream governments have taken over their trademark policy of closing borders to foreigners. Nonetheless, the grip on power of several pro-EU mainstream leaders, including President Emmanuel Macron in France, Prime Minister Conte in Italy and Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez in Spain, remains tenuous.
