In preparation of the 2018 Pension Adequacy Report by the European Commission and the Social Protection Committee, teams from Belgium, Sweden and Italy use their microsimulation models to simulate the possible developments of pension adequacy while taking into account the set of economic and demographic projections developed by the AWG. The results of this exercise complement the AWG simulations of pension expenditures in a context of demographic. The results described in detail in this report were summarised in section 5.1.2. of the 2018 Pension Adequacy Report

This working paper analyses the economic impact of a regulated professional services reform in Belgium through simulations based on the European Commission’s DSGE model QUEST III R&D

Monthly evolution of the consumer price index and of the so-called health index, which is used for the price indexation of wages, social benefits and house-rent.

This paper explores the possibility of building a multiregional migration model at the EU level based on Eurostat statistics on migration by country of previous and next residence, by country of birth or by citizenship. These statistics are used to build a consistent origin-destination matrix for the EU Member States. This matrix is then used to compute migration rates between EU countries, which can be inserted into a multiregional population projection model.

The ‘first recruitments’ measure aims at supporting job creation in new and small firms through a reduction in employers' social security contributions. However, part of the eligible employers does not claim this reduction. Using administrative data from the National Social Security Office, we seek to quantify this phenomenon, which may bias the intended effect of the measure, and to identify profiles of non-take-up.

This report presents a brief disaggregation of the budget balance of the sub-sector “communities and regions” that was published in the March 2018 “2018-2023 Economic Outlook”. The budget balances of the Flemish Community, the French-speaking Community, the Walloon Region and the Brussels-Capital Region are presented.

Between April 2013 and January 2015, youth sub-minimum wage rates were repealed in Belgium. We identify the impact of the reform by comparing outcomes before and after the withdrawal, across eligible and ineligible categories of young workers, and across abolishing and not abolishing joint committees. Our results show that the reform had a small positive impact on wages and on retention rates and a comparable but negative impact on accession rates.

The database PEACH2AIR links emissions of greenhouse and acidifying gases, of gases contributing to tropospheric ozone formation and particulate matter to consumer expenditures in Belgium in 2014. It relies on standardized air pollution data (including air emissions accounts), input-output tables and the Household Budget Survey. Analyses for 2014 show that energy products as well as food and non-alcoholic beverages are the most air polluting expenditure categories.

The Federal Planning Bureau publishes its 2017-2070 demographic projections for Belgium. This exercise notably reveals the impact of the disappearance of the baby boom generation, as well as certain regional differences.

Economic growth in the euro area was surprisingly high (2.5%) last year and is expected to remain solid (2.2%) in 2018. Against this backdrop, the growth forecasts for the Belgian economy in 2018 have been revised slightly upwards to 1.8%, compared to our September release. This favourable development leads to a rise in employment by 57000 people. This year, inflation is expected to cool down somewhat to 1.7% as a result of both the appreciation of the euro and the significant decrease in electricity prices in Flanders.

The 2017 Federal Report on Sustainable Development takes as its starting point the Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs) adopted at the UN. The report assesses 34 indicators showing the evolution of Belgium towards the SDGs and examines the gap between existing scenarios and the SDGs in 3 areas: poverty, energy and transportation. Current developments usually go in the right direction, but most often lag far behind the quantified objectives

The 2017 Federal Report on Sustainable Development takes as its starting point the Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs) adopted at the UN. The report assesses 34 indicators showing the evolution of Belgium towards the SDGs and examines the gap between existing scenarios and the SDGs in 3 areas: poverty, energy and transportation. Current developments usually go in the right direction, but most often lag far behind the quantified objectives.

This paper proposes a new model to account for unobserved heterogeneity in empirical modelling. The model extends the well-known Finite Mixture (or Latent Class) Model by using the Johnson family of distributions for the component densities. Due to the great variety of distributional shapes that can be assumed by the Johnson family, the method does not impose the usual a priori assumptions regarding the type of densities that are mixed.

This energy outlook describes the evolution of our national energy system by 2050, assuming unchanged policy. The analysis of this outlook makes it possible to assess, at Belgian level, whether it is necessary to adopt and the extent of new measures and policies in view of the 2030 European Framework for Climate and Energy and the transition towards a low-carbon society by 2050.

The objective of the report is to provide an overview of the main drivers of economic growth and the productivity evolution in Belgium, in comparison with its three neighbouring countries and the US over 1970 and 2015. Recent evolutions, over 2000-2015, are analysed in details in order to shed light on the impact of the great recession. The growth accounting methodology is applied to explain labour productivity growth for the total economy, manufacturing and market services.

The Federal Planning Bureau is responsible, within the National Accounts Institute, for producing the macroeconomic forecasts that are used to set up the federal government budget. This working paper presents an update of the ex post assessment of the quality of these forecasts.

This working paper provides an update of a study from 2007 in which the accuracy of the medium-term outlooks for the Belgian economy is assessed. The study is expanded with nine additional editions of the Economic Outlook covering a mixture of pre-crisis, crisis and post-crisis periods.

At the request of the federal Minister of Energy, this report was carried out as a follow-up on the cost-benefit analysis published by the Federal Planning Bureau in February 2017. It constitutes an addendum to the February study in that some additional questions impacting the Belgian production park are scrutinized in detail.