| Abstract: |
The doctoral thesis consists of three essays that address the application of synthetic control method to various economic policy intervention. In the first essay I evaluate the quantitative effects of the Czech National Bank’s commitment to keep the Koruna from appreciating that were put in place in 2013. I find that the commitment helped decrease unemployment substantially. The effect on overall output is also strongly positive, almost 2 percentage points for growth in 2015. The effect of the commitment on inflation is positive but not statistically significant at standard levels. In the second essay I focus on the impact of joining the EU on the Czech agriculture. The results show that the Czech Republic would have had a higher food index if it had not entered the CAM and CAP. Moreover, I show that the CAP and CAM had different impacts on farms in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria, which have the most comparable agriculture according to the results of the synthetic control method. In the final essay I estimate how the UK financial markets would have evolved if the Remain camp had won the referendum. The results suggest that there would not have been any significant change in the development of the FTSE 100 Index in the medium to long term if there had not been a referendum. On the other hand, I find a significantly negative effect of 1.2 percentage points on the 10-year bond yield. |
