Fiscal & Taxation Briefings

February 1, 2017

The Economics of Industry 4.0

Viewed over the sweep of history, concerns about technological unemployment have always proved overblown. Over the last two-hundred years, technology has created more jobs than it has destroyed and it has substantially increased labour productivity and living standards.
January 1, 2017

The Solution to the Spanish Pension System

It is increasingly evident that public pensions are going to be hard to sustain in the future: the ratio of workers to pensioners is close to a historical low. The crisis has taken nearly two million contributors out of the system, and adds to another variable that proves a greater challenge and is even more difficult to reverse: demographics.
January 1, 2017

The Past and Future of European Federalism: Spinelli VS. Hayek

The year 2017 will mark the sixty-year anniversary of the Treaties of Rome. On this occasion, the European project will receive a thorough check-up, and important decisions will be made that will decide whether and in what form it survives.
October 1, 2016

Innovation in Regulatory Approaches

An important part of the digital platform revolution is the sharing economy, which is based on reductions in transaction costs which enable exchanges that were previously not possible. Sharing economy firms facilitate a more efficient use of assets, to the benefit of both asset owners and prospective users.
October 1, 2016

Innovation in Food Labelling

According the European Commission, a Geographical Indication (GI) is “a distinctive sign used to identify a product as originating in the territory of a particular country, region or locality where its quality, reputation or other characteristic is linked to its geographical origin.” Under the system of GIs, the European Union has protected over 3,300 food and wine names with, as of 2010, an estimated value of €54.3 billion.
October 1, 2016

Innovation in Harm Reduction

Scientific research has made important breakthroughs in harm reduction in recent years. In the field of alcohol consumption, safer and healthier options are being developed, whereas in the area of nicotine delivery, e-cigarettes have been shown to significantly mitigate adverse health effects associated with smoking.