Regional integration and income inequality: a synthetic counterfactual analysis of the European Monetary Union
使用合成反事实方法，估计欧元区国家若未采用单一货币，其总收入与净收入不平等的变化，发现欧元加剧了总收入不平等但降低了净收入不平等。
Abstract In Europe, it is quite common for public opinions and national politicians to blame economic insecurity and rising inequality on deeper regional integration within the European Union (EU), and especially on the euro. There is, however, no empirical research that clearly identifies the euro as the cause of the recent increase in income inequality. Using the synthetic counterfactual methodology developed by Abadie and Gardeazabal (2003), I estimate what would have happened to inequality in both gross and net income within euro-area countries, had these countries not switched to the single currency. In most countries (especially peripheral countries), without the euro, gross-income inequality would have been lower, while net-income inequality would have been higher. These results imply that, while deeper economic integration might have exacerbated gross income inequality, lower interest rates allowed countries to counteract these disparities with their social welfare programmes.