IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aka/aoecon/v62y2012i2p183-204.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Income convergence in Europe: Catching up or falling behind?

Author

Listed:
  • Megan Czasonis

    (Bentley University, Department of Economics, 175 Forest Street, Waltham MA 02452, USA)

  • Michael A. Quinn

    (Bentley University, Department of Economics, 175 Forest Street, Waltham MA 02452, USA)

Abstract

One of the motivations for a country to join the European Union is the belief that this will boost short- and long-run incomes. Researchers have tested the hypothesis of income convergence in different settings using either regression or unit root analysis, with mixed results. In this paper, we use both methods on the same samples over a significant time period. This allows us to judge differences in results across varied time-frames and methodologies. The focus of these tests is on convergence to German and EMU average incomes by Eastern European countries and those within the Euro-zone from 1971–2007. The evidence for convergence is mixed. Among the Euro-zone countries, there is more evidence of convergence in the 1970s and 1980s than recently. There is significant evidence that Eastern Europe experienced convergence and that capital formation was one of the root causes. While the results do not support the hypothesis that joining the EU increases convergence, reforms undertaken in the 1990s by Eastern European countries in preparation for joining may have helped them to “catch up”, even if the act of joining the EU did not directly impact convergence.

Suggested Citation

  • Megan Czasonis & Michael A. Quinn, 2012. "Income convergence in Europe: Catching up or falling behind?," Acta Oeconomica, Akadémiai Kiadó, Hungary, vol. 62(2), pages 183-204, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:aka:aoecon:v:62:y:2012:i:2:p:183-204
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://akademiai.com/content/597631872183107g/fulltext.pdf
    Download Restriction: subscription
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kozlova, Olesia & de Jesus Noguera, Jose, 2018. "Achievers or slackers? Per capita income trends in European countries," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 1332-1345.
    2. Anna Busłowska & Jacek Marcinkiewicz, 2023. "Social Cohesion of Functional Urban Areas (Example of Eastern Poland)," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 167(1), pages 451-473, June.
    3. Anatolijs Prohorovs & Julija Bistrova, 2022. "Labour Share Convergence in the European Union," Economies, MDPI, vol. 10(9), pages 1-21, August.
    4. Mirjana Gligoric, 2014. "Paths Of Income Convergence Between Country Pairs Within Europe," Economic Annals, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Belgrade, vol. 59(201), pages 123-156, April – J.
    5. Xanthippi Chapsa & Athanasios L. Athanasenas & Nikolaos Tabakis, 2019. "Real Convergence in EU-15: A Comparative Analysis of North versus South Europe," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3), pages 3-21.
    6. Matkowski, Zbigniew & Prochniak, Mariusz & Rapacki, Ryszard, 2016. "Real Income Convergence between Central Eastern and Western Europe: Past, Present, and Prospects," EconStor Conference Papers 146992, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    7. Sakiru Adebola Solarin & Sinan Erdogan & Ugur Korkut Pata, 2023. "Convergence of Income Inequality in OECD Countries Since 1870: A Multi-Method Approach with Structural Changes," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 166(3), pages 601-626, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    income convergence; European Union; Euro-zone;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O4 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity
    • F5 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aka:aoecon:v:62:y:2012:i:2:p:183-204. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kriston, Orsolya (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://akademiai.hu/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.