Financial institutions

Homeownership rates and holdings of housing wealth differ immensely across countries. Using micro data from five economies, we estimate a life-cycle model with illiquid housing in which households face a discrete–continuous choice between renting and owning a house. We use the model to decompose the cross-country differences in the homeownership rate and the value of housing wealth into three groups of explanatory factors: house price expectations, the institutional set-up of the housing market and preferences. We find that all three groups of factors matter, although preferences less so.

An increase of e100 per tonne in the EU carbon price reduces the carbon footprint but lowers GDP due to higher energy costs and carbon leakage. Using a dynamic multi-sector, multi-country model augmented with an energy block that includes endogenous renewable energy investment, we analyze the macroeconomic and emissions effects of a carbon price. Investment in renewable energy mitigates electricity price increases in the medium term, leading to a smaller GDP loss (up to -0.4%) and a larger emissions reduction (24%) in the EU.

The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee is responsible for making decisions about Bank Rate.

Housing expenditure shares decline with income. A household’s income determines its sensitivity to housing costs and drives its location decision. Has spatial skill sorting increased because low income individuals are avoiding increasingly expensive regions? I augment a standard quantitative spatial model with flexible non-homothetic preferences to estimate the effect of the national increase in the relative supply of high skilled workers that has put upward pressure on housing costs in skill-intensive cities.