Job accessibility plays a vital role in enhancing commuting flows and integrating local labour markets. For this reason, public authorities often invest in large-scale transport infrastructure projects to improve accessibility for workers and visitors. Nonetheless, such improvements may raise important questions about the spatial distribution of benefits delivered. This study probes how these projects affect job accessibility at the submunicipal level, focusing on the island of Crete in Greece.

Three major transport project scenarios are evaluated, as well as combinations of them: (1) the (ongoing) construction of a new motorway network, (2) a new international airport in Heraklion and an associated motorway linking several municipal units with this airport, and (3) a hypothetical railway line traversing most of the island’s surface. The analysis draws on detailed data originating from the National Census and employs advanced GIS-related techniques and accessibility indices based on a gravity model to evaluate job access for various building types as employment opportunities. Equity is assessed at both horizontal and vertical dimensions, incorporating Gini, Palma and concentration indices as well as spatial autocorrelation analysis.

The results show that, while the projects significantly enhance job accessibility, the benefits are unevenly distributed, with notable disparities between the island’s eastern and western parts. Nevertheless, multimodal solutions based on rail and improved motorway options favour equity in the region. These findings can offer valuable insights for policymakers, planners, and investors, by highlighting the need for integrated and inclusive transport strategies that consider multi-scale impacts and diverse mobility needs.

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Το άρθρο NO. 166. EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF LARGE-SCALE TRANSPORT INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS ON JOB ACCESSIBILITY IN CRETE, GREECE εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

Abstract

This paper studies the timing of the motherhood penalty using monthly panel data from the EU-SILC for Greece (2003–2024) and an event-study design that aligns women by both conception and childbirth. Exploiting within-woman variation, we document substantial labor supply adjustments that begin at conception, well before birth. Labor force participation and employment decline by around 8 percent following conception—nearly twice the magnitude of the post-birth reduction.

Dynamic estimates show that these adjustments emerge immediately after conception and persist throughout pregnancy, consistent with forward-looking behavior rather than responses driven solely by postnatal childcare demands.

The effects are highly heterogeneous: the largest penalties are concentrated among younger, less educated, lower-income, unmarried, and foreign-born women. Variation by employment type and sector further reveals that self-employed women and private-sector employees disengage earlier and more sharply than their public-sector counterparts. Taken together, the results suggest that motherhood-related labor market penalties in Greece are both substantial and front-loaded, beginning during pregnancy rather than at birth.

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Το άρθρο NO. 165. LABOR SUPPLY RESPONSES TO CONCEPTION AND CHILDBIRTH εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

This paper examines mental health patterns in Greece during the COVID-19 pandemic, focusing on labor-market disruptions—primarily income losses and changes in working hours. Using longitudinal EU-SILC data (2019–2024) and first-difference models with individual fixed effects, we estimate the within-person impact of economic shocks on self-reported mental health. Our findings indicate that income losses were significantly associated with an increased likelihood of mental health deterioration, while increases in working hours demonstrated a modest protective association.

These associations exhibited strong heterogeneity across groups. Income shocks were more strongly linked to mental health changes for men, while adjustments in working hours showed a greater link for women. Mid- to late-career workers experienced the most pronounced mental health deterioration in association with income losses, possibly reflecting greater financial and family obligations, whereas younger adults also showed notable associations, consistent with greater economic uncertainty. Occupational characteristics further influenced these patterns: increased hours were a protective factor for private sector workers and employees, while reduced hours were associated with improved mental health among the self-employed, suggesting workload flexibility may alleviate stress.

Despite job-retention policies limiting layoffs, labor market adjustments in Greece primarily involved income reductions and changes in working hours, which were associated with substantial psychological burdens. These findings underscore the importance of income-stabilization measures and integrated labor market mental health support during economic crises.

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Το άρθρο NO. 164. INCOME SHOCKS, WORKING HOURS, AND MENTAL HEALTH DURING COVID-19 εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

Using a newly constructed narrative dataset of fiscal adjustments for 17 advanced and 12 developing economies from 1980 to 2020, this paper investigates the effectiveness of fiscal consolidations in reducing public debt and how their outcomes depend on the level of private indebtedness and private investment, using state-dependent local projection methods. I find that a 1% of GDP fiscal adjustment translates to a reduction in public debt by 2.76% over the medium term, with the effects varying across economic contexts.

Consolidations are more effective in economies with low private debt or high private investment, whereas high private indebtedness or weak investment conditions limit or even reverse the effect. Initial fiscal positions, sovereign default risk, and central bank independence further shape outcomes, with stronger debt reductions observed in low-debt, high-risk, and high-independence states. The composition of fiscal adjustments also matters, as spending-based adjustments reduce public debt more effectively than tax-based adjustments.

These results underscore the importance of accounting for private sector dynamics and institutional factors when designing fiscal consolidation strategies.

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Το άρθρο NO. 163. THE EFFECTS OF AUSTERITY ON FISCAL PRUDENCE: THE ROLE OF PRIVATE INDEBTEDESS AND PRIVATE INVESTMENT εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

The paper proposes a new approach in public economics, in a decentralized finance setting, by using distributed optimization techniques to help plan inter-regional and intra-regional public goods and services for multiple regions, each region with its own budget, natural and population characteristics.

The goal is to provide policy makers with a planning optimization tool for public infrastructure spanning over a number of regions in a way that improves the welfare of its constituent populations. To that end it treats the problem as a utility maximization problem and calculates the Marshallian demand for public infrastructure.

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Το άρθρο NO. 162. DISTRIBUTED OPTIMIZATION IN PUBLIC ECONOMICS VIA DECENTRALIZED PUBLIC FINANCE: A PROPOSAL FOR THE SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION OF PUBLIC GOODS AND SERVICES εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

This paper computes public sector efficiency scores in a group of 39 advanced and emerging market economies from 2000 to 2021. Next, it examines by means of the local projection method the short- to medium-term effects of public sector efficiency on the debt ratio, productivity, and private investment.

We find that an increase in public sector efficiency lowers public debt and enhances its medium-term sustainability. It also significantly increases labor productivity, while yielding more moderate gains in terms of total-factor productivity. The impact on private investment is marginally positive over the medium term. The results remain valid after several robustness checks have been performed.

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Το άρθρο NO. 161. PUBLIC SECTOR EFFICIENCY: IMPLICATIONS FOR PUBLIC DEBT, GROWTH AND PRODUCTIVITY εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

Using a novel historical dataset of Greek public finances from 1833 to 1939, we investigate the cyclical behavior of public spending, tax buoyancy, and the impact of political transformations, wars and bankruptcies in Greece. Our findings indicate that territorial expansions increased public spending cyclicality, resulting in a deficit and debt bias

Tax buoyancy declined until the early 20th century but improved from the 1920s onward. Poor initial fiscal conditions and enhanced democratic quality mitigate pro-cyclical spending and boost tax revenue buoyancy. Both war and bankruptcy episodes significantly elevated the debt-service to-GDP ratio and reduced economic activity in the medium-term.

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Το άρθρο NO. 160. FISCAL CYCLICALITY, WAR AND BANKRUPTCIES IN GREECE, 1833-1939 εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

This paper examines the asymmetric effect of exports on economic growth over the short and long run in the Euro Area countries. To this end, I employ a cointegrating Nonlinear Autoregressive Distributed Lag (NARDL) model suggested by Shin, Yu, and Greenwood-Nimmo (2014), using annual data from 1980 to 2022

The findings indicate that exports react differently to increases and decreases over the long run in Italy and the Netherlands and in the short run in Austria – an effect previously ignored in the empirical literature. Finally, the elasticity of adverse shocks of exports on economic growth is significantly greater than that of positive export shocks.

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Το άρθρο NO. 159. IS THE EXPORT-LED-GROWTH HYPOTHESIS ASSYMETRIC IN THE EURO AREA COUNTRIES? εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

The sharp, persistent increase in the general price level in Greece from 2021 on, along with the way statistics regarding the economy are discussed in certain media outlets in Greece, give the impression that per capita GDP is falling, but this is not the case. The paper examines the way the economy evolved in terms of real per capita GDP, prices, and welfare over time, and in relation to the rest of the EU-27, as well as the factors that seem to affect the general price level. The findings are useful both for dealing with inflation in Greece, and for expanding real income in Greece.

Sooner or later the European Central Bank will reign in the inflation rate to the desired 2% target in the eurozone. However, to the extent Greece has considerable catching up to do due to its long economic recession in the 2010s, as well as new needs to address, an expansion of the aggregate demand and price increases seem inevitable. To offset the latter, it is necessary to raise the aggregate supply: to strengthen production and competition across markets, industries, products and inputs; to cease raising the minimum wage and indirect taxes; to restore mid-season sales and consider ideas and practices likely to affect price reductions; and to address imported inflation, whether it stems from the pricing practices of multinationals or from the import pricing practices of the European Commission.

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Το άρθρο No. 158. ΤHE EVOLUTION OF PRICES, THE RECENT INFLATION WAVE IN GREECE, AND POLICY SUGGESTIONS εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.

Using Labour Force Survey data the size and direction of the impact of education on employment prospects in Greece is explored along two axes: region and time. The findings suggest that educational attainment is important across regions at all times, but its impact on employment prospects varies along both axes. In general, more educated individuals enjoy an employment premium, but there are considerable differences across regions, especially with regards to higher levels of education, that should concern policy makers. Moreover, during the recession the employment premium of education decreased with the exception of post-graduate studies which seem to be recession proof and, thus, a legitimate choice to improve one’s chances of being employed.

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Το άρθρο No. 157. THE REGIONALLY DIVERSE ROLE OF EDUCATION ON EMPLOYMENT PROSPECTS IN GREECE εμφανίστηκε πρώτα στο Κέντρο Προγραμματισμού και Οικονομικών Ερευνών.