During the 70s of the twentieth century economists realized that public expenditures and rulemaking have similar effects on resource allocation and equity. Thus, the process of creating regulations entered the orbit of the economic cost-benefit analysis. This article is dedicated to the genesis and development of impact assessment in the United States, the European Union and Bulgaria.

The aim of the study is to bring out the business models for intellectual property management, which are a prerequisite for the formation of business concentrations in the creative industries. The aim is achieved by studying the economic characteristics of intellectual property as a business asset; by analyzing the models of economic realization applicable to intangible assets and by bringing out the leading economic effects from the formation of business concentrations such as outsourcing and joint ventures. The research methodology is interdisciplinary, using as a priority the method of comparative analysis and the synthesis of the theory and practice in the field of intellectual property management.

In this study the financial resources from the Structural and Cohesion Funds which Bulgaria has received are analyzed, presented as expenditures from the EU budget and their link to economic growth is examined. Quarterly statistical data covering the period 2008-2014 is used, along with 28 observations. A standard linear regression is applied for the calculation of the coefficients and the interpretation of the results in the form of the least squares method. The results of the empirical analysis show that there is a proportional statistically significant link between the financial resources from the EU budget and the economic growth of Bulgaria. It is assumed that the expenditure incurred during the analyzed period under the Structural and Cohesion Funds has led to a 1% increase in the economic growth of the country.

The impact of the rate of absorption of EU funds on the rate of short-term economic growth, the rate of employment and the unemployment rate in the countries in Central and Eastern Europe in the period 2008-2015 is analyzed. A regression analysis of panel data is performed, following the least squares method (LSM). The results of the analysis show that the rate of absorption of EU funds has no statistically significant effect on the rate of short-term economic growth and the employment rate in the countries of this region, but that it affects the unemployment rate in them.

We provide a short introduction into the concept of Constitutional Economics. This approach is a subfield within Public Choice Theory. Public Choice and Constitutional Economics are closely related to the name of James Buchanan who, together with his colleagues, initiated Public Choice Theory in the 1950’s and Constitutional Economics in the 1980’s. The latter emphasizes the choice of these rules, e.g. the constitutional framework of a society that structures social order. The choice of rules is modeled as acts of exchange in the political process.

On 15.06.2017 at the Institute of Economic Studies at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (IESB), within the framework of the bilateral Bulgarian-Romanian project of the same name, a conference on "Bulgaria and Romania EU Member States, Part of the World Economy" was held, organized by the International Economics Section of the IESB in cooperation with the Institute of World Economy at the Romanian Academy (ISE-RA).1 The conference was opened with an address by the Director of the IESB Prof. Dr. Alexander Tasev.

In September 2017, the new book by Prof. Dr. Vasil Tsanov, Prof. Dr. Georgi Shopov, Prof. Dr. Iskra Beleva and Prof. Dr. Yordan Christoskov - an established team of authors from the Institute of Economic Research at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, well known for their professional expertise - was published. The monograph is a logical continuation of the earlier publication "The Labour Market and Social Protection in the Economic Development of Bulgaria (1990-2011)", thus the two works cover nearly 30 years of the history of the development of the researched areas - the subject of constant public attention and interest. In the introduction, the authors provide a reasoned motivation for the chosen topic, which is related to the radical changes in the state of the labour market, labour income and the social security system that occurred during the last global financial and economic crisis and in the post-crisis period, as well as to the need in this unfavourable situation to meet Bulgaria's national objectives, developed and adopted in accordance with the EU's Europe 2020 Strategy.