IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ebl/ecbull/eb-09-00317.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

What if the euro had never been launched? A counterfactual analysis of the macroeconomic impact of euro membership

Author

Listed:
  • Emmanuel Dubois

    (PESOR, University of Paris XI)

  • Jerome Hericourt

    (EQUIPPE, University of Lille and CES, University of Paris 1)

  • Valerie Mignon

    (EconomiX-CNRS, University of Paris Ouest and CEPII)

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to gauge quantitatively the macroeconomic impact of EMU membership. Building on the Global VAR framework designed by Pesaran et al. (2004), we want to shed light on the following important questions: What if the euro had never been launched? How would national outputs and inflation rates have evolved? We show that monetary unification promoted lower interest rates and higher output in most euro area (EA) countries, relatively to a situation where national monetary policies would have followed a German-type one. If national monetary policies had adopted British monetary preferences after September 1992 however, this would have led to higher interest rates, depreciations of national exchange rates and higher output in most EA countries, especially over the 1992-1998 period. This is particularly true for the three biggest countries of the EA (France, Germany and Italy). Besides, the single currency regime probably did not have a massive impact on price developments.

Suggested Citation

  • Emmanuel Dubois & Jerome Hericourt & Valerie Mignon, 2009. "What if the euro had never been launched? A counterfactual analysis of the macroeconomic impact of euro membership," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 29(3), pages 2241-2255.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-09-00317
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.accessecon.com/Pubs/EB/2009/Volume29/EB-09-V29-I3-P70.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alexis Penot & Grégory Levieuge, 2009. "The Fed and the ECB: why such an apparent difference in reactivity?," Journal of Financial Economic Policy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 1(4), pages 319-337, November.
    2. Cukierman, Alex & Lippi, Francesco, 2001. "Labour Markets and Monetary Union: A Strategic Analysis," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 111(473), pages 541-565, July.
    3. Filippo di Mauro & L. Vanessa Smith & Stephane Dees & M. Hashem Pesaran, 2007. "Exploring the international linkages of the euro area: a global VAR analysis," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(1), pages 1-38.
    4. M. Hashem Pesaran & L. Vanessa Smith & Ron P. Smith, 2007. "What if the UK or Sweden had joined the euro in 1999? An empirical evaluation using a Global VAR," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(1), pages 55-87.
    5. Barry Eichengreen, 1992. "Is Europe an Optimum Currency Area?," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Silvio Borner & Herbert Grubel (ed.), The European Community after 1992, chapter 8, pages 138-161, Palgrave Macmillan.
    6. Arturo Estrella & Jeffrey C. Fuhrer, 2002. "Dynamic Inconsistencies: Counterfactual Implications of a Class of Rational-Expectations Models," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(4), pages 1013-1028, September.
    7. Jeff Fuhrer & Arturo Estrella, 1999. "Are 'Deep' Parameters Stable? The Lucas Critique as an Empirical Hypothesis," Computing in Economics and Finance 1999 621, Society for Computational Economics.
    8. Pesaran M.H. & Schuermann T. & Weiner S.M., 2004. "Modeling Regional Interdependencies Using a Global Error-Correcting Macroeconometric Model," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 22, pages 129-162, April.
    9. Clarida, Richard & Gali, Jordi & Gertler, Mark, 1998. "Monetary policy rules in practice Some international evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(6), pages 1033-1067, June.
    10. Gianmarco I.P. Ottaviano & Daria Taglioni & Filippo di Mauro, 2009. "The euro and the competitiveness of European firms [‘Optimal currency areas’]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 24(57), pages 6-53.
    11. Carlstrom, Charles T. & Fuerst, Timothy S., 2006. "Oil Prices, Monetary Policy, and Counterfactual Experiments," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 38(7), pages 1945-1958, October.
    12. Tony Cavoli & Ramkishen S. Rajan, 2006. "Monetary Policy Rules For Small And Open Developing Economies: A Counterfactual Policy Analysis," Journal of Economic Development, Chung-Ang Unviersity, Department of Economics, vol. 31(1), pages 89-111, June.
    13. Andrew K. Rose, 2000. "One money, one market: the effect of common currencies on trade," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 15(30), pages 08-45.
    14. De Grauwe, Paul, 1995. "Alternative strategies towards monetary union," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 39(3-4), pages 483-491, April.
    15. Taylor, John B., 1993. "Discretion versus policy rules in practice," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 195-214, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Marçal, Emerson Fernandes & Cunha, Ronan & Merlin, Giovanni Tondin & Simões, Oscar, 2017. "The aftermath of 2008 turmoil on Brazilian economy: Tsunami or “Marolinha”?," Textos para discussão 459, FGV EESP - Escola de Economia de São Paulo, Fundação Getulio Vargas (Brazil).
    2. Ludovic Gauvin & Cyril C. Rebillard, 2018. "Towards recoupling? Assessing the global impact of a Chinese hard landing through trade and commodity price channels," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(12), pages 3379-3415, December.
    3. Alexander Chudik & M. Hashem Pesaran, 2016. "Theory And Practice Of Gvar Modelling," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(1), pages 165-197, February.
    4. Gauvin, Ludovic & Rebillard, Cyril, 2013. "Towards Recoupling? Assessing the Impact of a Chinese Hard Landing on Commodity Exporters: Results from Conditional Forecast in a GVAR Model," MPRA Paper 65457, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Luciano Greco & Francesco Jacopo Pintus & Davide Raggi, 2023. "When Fiscal Discipline meets Macroeconomic Stability: the Euro-stability Bond," "Marco Fanno" Working Papers 0300, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche "Marco Fanno".
    6. Hamza Bennani, 2013. "Does the ECB consider the persistence of inflation differentials?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 33(3), pages 2129-2139.
    7. Hamza Bennani, 2012. "National influences inside the ECB: an assessment from central bankers' statements," Working Papers hal-00992646, HAL.
    8. Xue, Huidan & Li, Chenguang & Wang, Liming, 2018. "The Global Vector Error Correction Model application on the dynamics and drivers of the World Butter Export Prices: Evidence from the U.S., the EU, and New Zealand," 2018 Annual Meeting, August 5-7, Washington, D.C. 273971, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    9. Puzzello, Laura & Gomis-Porqueras, Pedro, 2018. "Winners and losers from the €uro," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 129-152.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jérôme Héricourt, 2004. "And if one size fit all after all? A counterfactual examination of the ECB monetary policy under Duisenberg presidency," Cahiers de la Maison des Sciences Economiques bla04004a, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), revised Nov 2005.
    2. Linde, Jesper, 2005. "Estimating New-Keynesian Phillips curves: A full information maximum likelihood approach," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(6), pages 1135-1149, September.
    3. Lindé, Jesper, 2001. "The Empirical Relevance of Simple Forward- and Backward-looking Models: A View from a Dynamic General Equilibrium Model," Working Paper Series 130, Sveriges Riksbank (Central Bank of Sweden).
    4. Cécile Bastidon, 2013. "Un modèle théorique d'intermédiation : transmission et gestion des chocs," Post-Print hal-00806524, HAL.
    5. Kuikeu, Oscar, 2011. "Arguments contre la zone franc [Against the cfa franc zone]," MPRA Paper 33710, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Wollmershauser, Timo, 2006. "Should central banks react to exchange rate movements? An analysis of the robustness of simple policy rules under exchange rate uncertainty," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 493-519, September.
    7. Feldkircher, Martin, 2015. "A global macro model for emerging Europe," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(3), pages 706-726.
    8. Konstantinos N. Konstantakis & Panayotis G. Michaelides & Livia Chatzieleftheriou & Arsenios‐Georgios N. Prelorentzos, 2022. "Crisis and the Chinese miracle: A network—GVAR model," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 74(3), pages 900-921, July.
    9. Alexis Penot & Grégory Levieuge, 2009. "The Fed and the ECB: why such an apparent difference in reactivity?," Journal of Financial Economic Policy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 1(4), pages 319-337, November.
    10. Konstantakis, Konstantinos N. & Michaelides, Panayotis G., 2014. "Transmission of the debt crisis: From EU15 to USA or vice versa? A GVAR approach," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 115-132.
    11. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/5221 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Clémentine Florens & Eric Jondeau & Hervé Le Bihan, 2001. "Assessing GMM Estimates of the Federal Reserve Reaction Function," Econometrics 0111003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Alexander Chudik & M. Hashem Pesaran, 2016. "Theory And Practice Of Gvar Modelling," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(1), pages 165-197, February.
    14. Peter Backé & Martin Feldkircher & Tomáš Slacík, 2013. "Economic Spillovers from the Euro Area to the CESEE Region via the Financial Channel: A GVAR Approach," Focus on European Economic Integration, Oesterreichische Nationalbank (Austrian Central Bank), issue 4, pages 50-64.
    15. Ong, Sheue Li & Sato, Kiyotaka, 2018. "Regional or global shock? A global VAR analysis of Asian economic and financial integration," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 232-248.
    16. Kamiar Mohaddes & Mehdi Raissi, 2019. "The US oil supply revolution and the global economy," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 57(5), pages 1515-1546, November.
    17. Éric Jondeau & Hervé Le Bihan, 2002. "Evaluating Monetary Policy Rules in Estimated Forward-Looking Models: A Comparison of US and German Monetary Policies," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 67-68, pages 357-388.
    18. Carvalho, Carlos & Masini, Ricardo & Medeiros, Marcelo C., 2018. "ArCo: An artificial counterfactual approach for high-dimensional panel time-series data," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 207(2), pages 352-380.
    19. Wyplosz, Charles, 1999. "Towards A More Perfect EMU," CEPR Discussion Papers 2252, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. Huber, Florian, 2016. "Density forecasting using Bayesian global vector autoregressions with stochastic volatility," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 818-837.
    21. Ronald A. Ratti & Joaquin L. Vespignani, 2015. "What drives the global interest rate," Globalization Institute Working Papers 241, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Euro; counterfactual analysis; global VAR.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C3 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables
    • E4 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-09-00317. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: John P. Conley (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.