Cross-country insurance mechanisms in currency unions

Countries in a monetary union can adjust to shocks either through internal or external mechanisms. We quantitatively assess for the European Union&nbs

Publishing date: 27 March 2014
Authors: Michiel Bijlsma Gijsbert Zwart

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Countries in a monetary union can adjust to shocks either through internal or external mechanisms. We quantitatively assess for the European Union a number of relevant mechanisms suggested by Mundell’s optimal currency area theory, and compare them to the United States.

For this purpose, we update a number of empirical analyses in the economic literature that identify (1) the size of asymmetries across countries and (2) the magnitude of insurance mechanisms relative to similar mechanisms and compare results for the European Monetary Union (EMU) with those obtained for the US.

To study the level of synchronization between EMU countries we follow Alesina et al. (2002) and Barro and Tenreyro (2007). To measure the effect of an employment shock on employment levels, unemployment rates and participation rates we perform an analysis based on Blanchard and Katz (1992) and Decressin and Fatas (1995). We measure consumption smoothing through capital markets, fiscal transfers and savings, using the approach by Asdrubali et al. (1996) and Afonso and Furceri (2007). To analyze risk sharing through a common safety net for banks we perform a rudimentary simulation analysis.

About the authors

Michiel Bijlsma

Michiel heads the competition and regulation department at the Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis (CPB). The sector comprises three research programs: Financial Markets, Health Care, and Innovation and Science. He has a PhD in theoretical physics from the University of Utrecht, and is a visiting fellow at Tilec, University of Tilburg. Michiel Bijlsma joined Bruegel as a visiting fellow in January 2012 and has been affiliated as a Non-Resident Fellow until 2016.

Michiel’s research is in the areas of Corporate Governance, Banking, and Health Care markets. He has co-authored popular Dutch books on the 2007-2008 financial crisis and the current European debt crisis. Prior to his work for CPB, Michiel worked as a senior economist at the Netherlands Competition Authority on high-profile cases on fee structures of debit card payment systems and as a consultant for international firms at Ernst & Young risk management.
Gijsbert Zwart