This book examines economic policies utilized within Southeast Europe in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Covering countries both within and outside the European Union, the human and economic cost of the pandemic is calculated using macroeconomic models from a short and longer term perspective. The economic policies used during the pandemic are analyzed, alongside crisis management approaches, to highlight the effectiveness of monetary policy, fiscal policies and potential future economic solutions for the post COVID-19 period. This book aims to provide policy recommendations based on findings from Southeast Europe. It is relevant to researchers and policymakers involved in economic policy and the political economy, as well as anyone interested in the responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This book offers an assessment of the different monetary and fiscal policy responses that have been implemented by national governments in major European and Asian countries faced with the Covid-19 crisis since 2020; it also deals with the case of the US experience as a benchmarking example. The book provides a comprehensive cross-country comparative study on health crisis management at the macroeconomic level. Its focus on monetary and fiscal policies across different countries in Asia, Europe and the USA makes it unique. Divided into three parts following a general introduction that sets the context of the study, the book deals with the case of the USA, EU and European countries as well as with that of key Asian countries. Of specific relevance is the European Union and euro-area contexts that serve as a framework to the different EU national monetary and fiscal policy responses. Each chapter deals with a specific country, including Italy and the UK in Europe and Singapore and South Korea in Asia, and covers the following topics: the extent of the outbreak of the public health crisis and its macroeconomic impact; the comparative examination of fiscal and monetary policy responses to both crises; and an overall assessment of the effectiveness of these policies along with the public health policy to mitigate the economic impact. Given the unprecedented nature of the Covid-19 crisis, anyone eager to know more about its macroeconomic impact and ensuing policies in a comparative framework will be keen to read this book. It will be essential reading to any researcher, policy maker and/or analyst working in the area of public policy and is also a unique contribution to the field of European studies, Asian studies and Comparative Economic Studies.

A guide to the pandemic economy: essential reading about the long-term implications of our current crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic has unleashed a firehose of information (much of it wrong) and an avalanche of opinions (many of them ill-founded). Most of us are so distracted by the everyday awfulness that we don't see the broader issues in play. In this book, economist Joshua Gans steps back from the short-term chaos to take a clear and systematic look at how economic choices are being made in response to COVID-19. He shows that containing the virus and pausing the economy—without letting businesses fail and people lose their jobs—are the necessary first steps.

This book provides a novel in-depth study of the early pandemic response policy at the intersection of political economy and law. It explores: (1) whether the responses to COVID-19 were democratically accountable; (2) the ways in which new surveillance and enforcement techniques were adopted; (3) the new monetary and fiscal policies which were implemented; (4) the ways in which employed and unemployed persons were differently impacted by the new policies; and (5) how companies were economically sustained through the pandemic. A compelling look at what happens to societies when disaster strikes, this book will be of interest to legal scholars, political scientists and economists.

The phenomenon of shocks is often mentioned in relation to economic crises but rarely studied. This gap in research has resulted in shocks being poorly understood, with no fundamental explanation of their inciting conditions. It is a system-forming problem that cannot be investigated without dynamic ideas about the economy, but an incomplete understanding of this event leaves economic systems vulnerable to collapse. Theory of Shocks, COVID-19, and Normative Fundamentals for Policy Responses is an essential publication that explores the factors that cause economic shocks and the mechanisms of their implementation. The book serves as a resource for the development of policy-oriented frameworks for achieving and maintaining national and international strategies to properly manage future global shocks. Featuring coverage of a wide range of topics including dialectics, self-evolvement, and structural relationships, this book is ideally designed for economists, executives, managers, entrepreneurs, academicians, students, and researchers in the areas of finance, macroeconomics, economic theory, and risk assessment.

This book seeks to identify the reasons why some countries were more efficient and effective than others in responding to the COVID 19 pandemic, and why the global community failed to coalesce. What are the political determinants of the different state responses to the pandemic? Why was scientific advice rejected or ignored in many countries? What has been the role, respectively, of neoliberalism, populism, and authoritarianism in the making of Covid-19 policy? What role have each of these factors played in the uneven and clearly inadequate global response to the pandemic? In an effort to understand why some states failed to handle the pandemic properly, some of the literature suggests that populism is at the root of the current failure of international co-operation. The global financial crisis of 2008-10 triggered significant cooperation within the G-20, led by the combined efforts of the United States and China. These forms of cooperation have clearly disappeared in the context of the pandemic, not only with respect to economic policy but also in public health and management. The authors of this volume link the different state responses to the pandemic-- from its inception to the start of the vaccination campaign, and to the political regimes prevailing in each. In particular, the present volume focuses on a distinction between the responses of neo-liberal regimes, populist regimes and authoritarian ones.

Why solving the information problem should be at the core of our pandemic response: essential reading about the long-term implications of our current crisis. COVID-19 is caused by a virus. The COVID-19 pandemic is caused by a lack of good information. A pandemic is essentially an information problem: this is the enlightening and provocative idea at the heart of this book. If we solve the information problem, argues economist Joshua Gans, we can defeat the virus. For example, when we don't know who is infected, we have to act as if everyone is infected. If we actively manage the information problem--if we know who is infected and with whom they had contact--we can suppress the virus or buy time for vaccine development. This is an expanded version of an eBook originally published as Economics in the Age of COVID-19.

This technical note and manual (TNM) addresses the following issues: • Evaluating the full implications from the policies adopted to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the economy requires a well-developed macroeconomic framework. This note illustrates how such frameworks were used to analyze Colombia and Cambodia's shock impact at the beginning of the pandemic. • The use of macroeconomic frameworks is not to infer general policy conclusions from abstract models or empirical analysis but to help policymakers think through and articulate coherent forecasts, scenarios, and policy responses. • The two country cases illustrate how to construct a baseline scenario consistent with a COVID-19 shock within structural macroeconomic models. The scenario is built gradually to incorporate the available information, the pandemic's full effects, and the policy responses. • The results demonstrate the value of combining close attention to the data, near-term forecasting, and model-based analyses to support coherent policies.

This book underscores the post-COVID global uncertainties that are still occurring on the world stage and presents the recent challenges such as geo-political tensions, war, economic disturbances, climate change, the energy crisis in Europe, recessions in developed economies and their effect on developing and least developed economies.

​This book examines and classifies different reactions to the COVID-19 pandemic from economists across the world. With the impacts of the pandemic experienced differently in each country, specific case studies are provided to highlight how the economics profession has responded to the challenges that have emerged from COVID-19. Key debates, such as the trade-off between health protective measures and the economic impacts of closing important sectors, are discussed, with a focus on the responses in China, the USA, Italy, France, Russia, Argentina, Brazil, India, and Palestine. This book explores the ability of economists to respond to economic and social crises, and provides insight into the ties between economic theory and economic policy in the modern world. It will be relevant to students and researchers interested in how economists have responded to the COVID-19 and what changes it might trigger.