Promotional Information

In this collection some of the most innovative economists in the profession shed new light on why continental Europe has lost its dynamism. A must read for anyone seriously interested in the complex interrelations among institutions, culture, and economic growth. -- Peter Howitt, Lyn Crost Professor of Social Sciences, Department of Economics, Brown University To paraphrase Winston Churchill, Europe is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. Its economy is neither a smashing success nor a basket case but, like any economy, something in between. This collection of careful studies combining economic theory with institutional analysis goes a long way toward unwrapping the riddle. -- Barry Eichengreen, George C. Pardee and Helen N. Pardee Professor of Economics and Political Science, University of California, Berkeley

About the Author

Edmund S. Phelps is McVickar Professor of Political Economy at Columbia University and founder of Columbia's Center on Capitalism and Society. He was the 2006 Nobel Laureate in Economics. Hans-Werner Sinn is Professor of Economics and Public Finance at the University of Munich and President of the CESIfo Group. Author of Can Germany Be Saved? The Malaise of the World's First Welfare State (MIT Press) and other books, he is former president of the International Institute of Public Finance, and former chairman of the German Economic Association. Edmund S. Phelps is McVickar Professor of Political Economy at Columbia University and founder of Columbia's Center on Capitalism and Society. He was the 2006 Nobel Laureate in Economics. Hans-Werner Sinn is Professor of Economics and Public Finance at the University of Munich and President of the CESIfo Group. Author of Can Germany Be Saved? The Malaise of the World's First Welfare State (MIT Press) and other books, he is former president of the International Institute of Public Finance, and former chairman of the German Economic Association. Robert J. Shiller is Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University. He is the author of Finance and the Good Society and other books. Philippe Aghion is a Professor at the College de France and at the London School of Economics. Aghion is coauthor (with Peter Howitt) of Endogenous Growth Theory (MIT Press). James J. Heckman is the Henry Schultz Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago. He was a recipient of the Nobel Prize for Economic Sciences in 2000. He is the coauthor (with Alan B. Krueger) of Inequality in America: What Role for Human Capital Policies? (MIT Press). Jeffrey Sachs is Galen L. Stone Professor of International Trade at Harvard University, and has been an economic advisor to more than a dozen countries around the world, including Bolivia, Mongolia, Poland, and Russia.

Reviews

"In this collection some of the most innovative economists in the profession shed new light on why continental Europe has lost its dynamism. A must read for anyone seriously interested in the complex interrelations among institutions, culture, and economic growth." Peter Howitt , Lyn Crost Professor of Social Sciences, Department of Economics, Brown University "To paraphrase Winston Churchill, Europe is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. Its economy is neither a smashing success nor a basket case but, like any economy, something in between. This collection of careful studies combining economic theory with institutional analysis goes a long way toward unwrapping the riddle." Barry Eichengreen , George C. Pardee and Helen N. Pardee Professor of Economics and Political Science, University of California, Berkeley