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Conference Paper
Seismic shifts: the economic impact of demographic change: an overview
Most economic developments are hard to predict. Considerable uncertainty surrounds forecasts for output growth, inflation, and unemployment a year from now, for instance. But demographic developments are different in this respect. Although demographic surprises abound, the major trends build slowly, and the broad contours of medium-term outcomes become discernible well in advance.
Journal Article
Righting the scales: the search for balance in health care
Journal Article
Why the interest in reforming the International Monetary System?
The recent spate of severe financial crises has provoked an interest in international monetary reform not seen since the breakdown of the fixed exchange rate system 30 years ago. Indeed, the crises have forced both academic economists and policymakers to question some of their most basic assumptions about the appropriate design of the international monetary system. This article was the introductory paper at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston's conference on "Rethinking the International Monetary System," held in June 1999. The article reviews recent changes in the economic environment that ...
Conference Paper
Technology diffusion in U.S. manufacturing: the geographic dimension
Journal Article
Australia's approach to monetary policy
According to Australia's Reserve Bank Act, the central bank's broad policy objectives include maintaining the stability of the currency, full employment, and the economic prosperity and welfare of the people of Australia. In 1993 the Reserve Bank of Australia adopted a specific, and thus transparent, inflation target as its operating objective; it aims to keep overall inflation between 2 percent and 3 percent on average over the business cycle.
Journal Article
U.S. regional trade with Canada during the transition to free trade
This article examines the U.S. and Canadian responses to the early years of the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement from a U.S. regional perspective. It draws on a highly detailed data base from Statistics Canada. Although the article discusses which regions enjoyed the fastest growth in trade with Canada over this period, and why, the major focus of the study is the impact of increased integration on the nature of trade and investment flows between the two countries. The author explores, for example, whether trade has expanded on the basis of comparative resource endowments or has taken the ...
Journal Article
New England's links to the world economy
"Openness" to international trade and investment encourages technology transfer and productivity growth. It may also provide a degree of stability in the face of national and regional business cycles. To assess New Englands relative openness, this article surveys New Englands links with the world economy: its trade in goods and services, its banking ties, its inbound and (to the extent possible) its outbound foreign direct investments. ; The author finds evidence that New Englands 1987-89 export growth has been slow, and that inbound foreign investment recently has played a below-average ...