Editions

To which extend does wellbeing matter when it comes to voting? Are voters’ political decisions influenced by their own happiness? In their recent paper, “Happy Voters”, Federica Liberini, Michela Redoano and Eugenio Proto present the effect of wellbeing on voting intention and show that this indicator can be a good complement to the traditional indicators, such as financial and economic outcomes.

It is now clearer than ever that the backlash against free movement of workers and goods is a reality in many countries in the world. The UK voting for Brexit and the US pulling out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership are merely the two most striking examples of this change in attitudes towards free trade. This article discusses one possible explanation for this dramatic change: the inequality in the welfare gains from trade across different consumer groups.

A new KOF Working Paper analyses how adaptive learning can be implemented into macroeconomic modelling.