This paper studies the reasons why business cycles are more synchronized between some European economies than between others. It analyzes the cyclical co-movement of real GDP for 325 European country-pairs over the 1995–2018 period and finds that differences in industry composition can explain disparities in business cycle synchronization better than trade or financial linkages. The role of trade is studied by considering both bilateral trade intensity and common trade relationships with third countries. Bilateral financial integration is found to have a negative effect on GDP correlations, while sharing the euro has a positive but relatively small effect. However, the euro amplifies the negative effect of industry specialization on co-movement. The results also show that using more disaggregated sectorial data substantially increases the importance of differences in industry composition.

本文研究了一些欧洲经济体之间的商业周期比其他经济体更同步的原因。它分析了 1995 年至 2018 年期间 325 个欧洲国家对的实际 GDP 的周期性联动，发现行业构成的差异比贸易或金融联系更能解释商业周期同步的差异。通过考虑双边贸易强度和与第三国的共同贸易关系来研究贸易的作用。发现双边金融一体化对 GDP 相关性有负面影响，而共享欧元则有积极但相对较小的影响。然而，欧元放大了行业专业化对协同运动的负面影响。