Dutch banks were put under heavy strains early in the global downturn and have comparatively weak financial buffers to cope with new shocks. Falling house prices have increased the share of households with negative home equity to nearly 35% for home-owning households and 40% for mortgage holders.

Entrepreneurship is an important driver of economic growth, job creation and competitiveness. However, the small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) sector has been severely affected by the crisis, with access to bank finance being particularly difficult.

The 34-member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development welcomed a Memorandum of Understanding between the OECD and Ukraine which will help Ukraine’s efforts to tackle corruption, strengthen its tax system and promote competitiveness.

This paper investigates whether OECD countries are facing secular stagnation. Secular stagnation is defined as a situation when policy interest rates bounded at zero fail to stimulate demand sufficiently, due to low or negative neutral real interest rates and low inflation, and when ensuing prolonged and subdued growth undermines potential growth via labour hysteresis and discouraged investment.

The President of the French Republic, Mr. François Hollande, met the Heads of five international economic organisations at the OECD on Friday 17th October to discuss the challenges facing the global economy.

The OECD has updated its key textbook explaining how economic activity is monitored and measured.

This Working Paper studies ways to stimulate the private rental sector (PRS) of the housing market – and compares experiences with policies and reforms in Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and the Czech Republic.

The global economy remains stuck in low gear, but is expected to accelerate gradually if countries implement growth-supportive policies. Widening differences across countries and regions are adding to the major risks on the horizon, according to the advanced G20 release of the OECD’s latest Economic Outlook.

The OECD does not see deflation taking hold in the euro area, but the risk has risen.

Designing policies that protect society while allowing for Internet’s great economic potential to be fulfilled, is a difficult task. This paper investigates this challenge and takes stock of existing regulations in OECD and selected non-OECD countries in specific areas related to the digital economy.

Angel Gurría, Secretary-General of the OECD congratulated the newly elected President of Indonesia, Joko Widodo, for taking a bold first step in his economic reform agenda by substantially cutting fuel subsidies.

Modest global economic forecasts, continuing high unemployment, and downshifts in potential output,should spur governments with a greater sense of urgency to fully employ monetary, fiscal and structural policy levers to support growth, notably in Europe, according to the OECD’s latest Economic Outlook.

Norway has taken some good initiatives to combat money laundering and terrorist financing, but needs to establish overarching policies and strategies, and address significant weaknesses in a number of key areas, according to a new report by the Financial Action Task Force.

Beyond usual determinants of trade such as GDP, distance, contiguity, free trade areas and language, this analysis mainly focuses on the role of product market regulation stringency and heterogeneity, and on the role of employment protection.

This paper is making use of the OECD product market regulation (PMR) database to measure the heterogeneity of product market regulation across countries for the whole economy, for the main subcomponents of the PMR indicator and for the internet economy.

The OECD and the Government of Kazakhstan are signing today in Davos a Memorandum of Understanding on a two-year Country Programme, which will support an ambitious set of reforms of Kazakhstan’s policies and institutions.

Third Annual Conference on the theme of "Fiscal Policies and the Green Economy Transition: Generating Knowledge – Creating Impact" held at the University of Venice from 29 through 30 January 2015. The press release is available.

We therefore need a “copernician” change in our approach to the growth – inequality nexus: let’s not think growth first, and inequality thereafter but let’s consider both of them, together, in their circularity. In other words, let’s think “Inclusive Growth”, right from the start, and let’s make it another touchstone of our efforts and complement the Pittsburgh tryptic of strong, sustainable and balanced growth!

Cambiare il quadro politico-istituzionale in Italia è fondamentale per garantire che le ambiziose riforme in corso rilancino la crescita e aumentino la qualità della vita, secondo un nuovo rapporto dell’OCSE.

The Latvian economy is among the fastest-growing in the euro area, but continued reforms will promote a rapid and sustainable pace of convergence with upper-income countries while limiting the risk of repeated boom-and-bust cycles, according to the OECD Economic Survey of Latvia.

Chief Economist Catherine L. Mann will present the near-term prospects for the global economy on Wednesday 18 March at 11:00 a.m. (CET).

Improving the labour market performance of immigrants requires a two-fold strategy. First, policies specific to migrants need to be enhanced. Second, general reforms to improve the functioning of the economy, desirable in any case, could also have a significant positive impact on immigrants.

This paper investigates patterns in product market regulation across 34 OECD and 21 non-OECD countries, using an updated and revised version of the OECD’s indicators of product market regulation (PMR).

The low and declining female labour force participation rate in India despite strong growth over the past decade is puzzling and stands out among emerging markets. At the same time greater economic participation of women can be a source of inclusive growth, and wellbeing.

Regional inequality in Slovakia is among the highest in the OECD and is increasing. The main reason for regional disparity is the combination of low economic growth and job creation in the eastern and central part of the country and insufficient labour mobility to the west, in particular by low-skilled workers.

This paper explores the link between skill and qualification mismatch and labour productivity using cross-country industry data for 19 OECD countries.

This paper first decomposes labour productivity growth over 2000-11 into a within-industry, a shift and a cross effect in a number of countries and compares China with other countries over this period. This shift-share analysis also allows a comparison of within-sector productivity gains across a large number of sectors and countries.

In 2014, the US economy added more jobs than in any year since the 1990s. In fact, this longest streak of job growth on record has persisted into 2015. Inflation-adjusted wages are up by 1.4% annually over the last two years, more than twice the pace of the last recovery. But this is still not enough to make up for decades of subpar gains for middle-class families–a challenge shared by many other OECD economies.

This paper compares two competing empirical specifications across all OECD economies, where competing specifications correspond to the 'former' and 'new' specification for deriving measures of the unemployment gap which underlie the OECD’s Economic Outlook projections.

Both educational attainment and skills, as measured in the OECD Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), are high in Sweden. They are not perfect substitutes, but both are to some degree necessary for successfully integrating in the Swedish labour market.

OECD Ministers have endorsed updated guidelines to help national governments and regional groups create the right conditions to attract domestic and foreign investment.

The New Zealand economy has performed well in recent years, but bottlenecks in housing and urban infrastructure, inequalities in living standards and rising environmental pressures all pose challenges for sustaining robust growth and high levels of well-being over the long term, according to the OECD’s latest Economic Survey of New Zealand.

The slowdown in productivity over the past decade has added to concerns about the long-term economic outlook. But new OECD research shows that policy reforms can revive the diffusion of innovation and make better use of human talent to clear the path for higher and more inclusive productivity growth.

Much of the convergence of the Latvian economy needs to come from productivity increases. To achieve this, policy makers should do more to facilitate the integration of the economy into global trade and promote competitive business environment.

New Zealand generally performs well in terms of economic and social inclusion. It has high employment rates, and education and health-care systems work well for most.

A strong commitment to reform and a business-friendly environment have helped Ireland return to robust economic expansion, offering the government an opportunity to heal the scars of the crisis, according to the latest OECD Economic Survey of Ireland.

A well-functioning labour market is indispensable to promote job creation, increase living standards, and develop a cohesive society. In Italy, the various deficiencies of the labour market have resulted in high unemployment, low labour force participation and job-skill mismatch.

The determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) are explored with gravity models, using a Poisson estimator and a linear estimator, both with fixed effects.

Switzerland’s recent economic performance has been impressive, but with growth now slowing new reforms will be necessary to maintain high levels of prosperity and ensure future well-being, according to the latest OECD Economic Survey of Switzerland.

Austria has a model of "separate gender roles" in work, family and life arrangements which persists despite efforts to better balance these roles.

Latin America’s GDP growth slowdown deepened and is expected to be negative in 2015. For a second consecutive year, Latin America falls behind the average growth of OECD countries after a full decade of convergence with advanced economies, according to the Latin American Economic Outlook 2016.

Finland enjoys a high level of income and well-being, but the economy has weakened and new reforms will be necessary to restart growth, boost productivity increase employment and restore competitiveness, according to the latest OECD Economic Survey of Finland.

High house prices are being supported by very low interest rates, immigration-fuelled population growth and smaller family units, while demand is being bolstered by mortgage interest tax deductibility and institutional investors.

Countries that implement stringent environmental policies do not lose export competitiveness when compared against countries with more moderate regulations, according to a new OECD study that examines trade in manufactured goods between advanced and emerging economies.

Polish economic growth remains solid and unemployment is decreasing, but further investments in infrastructure and skills will be essential to sustain a continuing improvement in living standards, environmental quality and well-being, according to the latest OECD Economic Survey of Poland.

The data presented in the latest OECD Economic Survey of Ireland suggest that rather than "brain drain" Ireland exhibits "brains exchange", a large proportion of emigrants and immigrants are well qualified.

Italy’s low employment rate is associated with adverse labour market dynamics characterised differently across different categories of people.

Improving local infrastructure investments in Poland

The Irish economy is growing strongly, but there is a risk many households will be left behind despite robust growth. High joblessness especially among the low-educated and skill-biased wage differentials have induced high market income inequality, among the highest in the OECD.

This paper provides analysis of the regulatory governance of network sector regulators in electricity, gas, telecommunications, rail, airport and ports within the OECD as it stood in 2013.