How the Maastricht criteria and the Stability and Growth Pact affected real convergence in the European Union

The European Central Bank (ECB) monetary policy has been criticised for giving more attention to price stabilisation in Europe rather than encouraging higher growth and employment. It is now largely accepted that the Maastricht norms reinforced by the Stability Pact have imposed serious macroeconomic constraints on economic performance by not taking into account specific problems of the individual economies. An interesting issue to examine is how the Maastricht obligations and the Stability Pact restrictions have affected the process of real convergence between the European economies in the last two decades. The purpose of this paper is to test for convergence in living standards, productivity, investment and unemployment among the European countries. From this analysis and using panel data estimation techniques, it is possible to detect any significant influence (favourable or not) of the Maastricht rules on real convergence.