Suchergebnisse

Competitiveness, resilience, and convergence were topics that for decades were listed among the hot issues that have animated the scientific and political debates in the area of economic growth and economic development. For the new member states (NMS) of the European Union, which have accessed the Union since 2004, competitiveness and cohesion became from the first days of their EU membership key topics on their national policy agendas, both as directives of the EU policies to be transposed and implemented nationally and as genuine domestic concerns to be addressed by each of the NMS, while resilience revealed its importance a little bit later, on the occasion of the global economic crisis of 2008–2010 and subsequent recession. Considering their importance for the current and future socioeconomic development of the new member states, the authors present and briefly analyze the topics of competitiveness, resilience, and cohesion in a joint framework, at regional level, based on their common roots within the economic growth and development theories, with the help of a minimal, but powerful, set of relevant indicators, over three significant recent periods: ante-crisis, crisis, and post-crisis. The findings point toward both different and similar competitiveness, resilience, and convergence developments within the new member states and across countries, regions, and periods, also revealing growth and adaptation patterns similar to those found in the more developed regions and countries of the EU, especially in the wake of the global economic crisis.

Abstract
Increasingly obvious over the last two decades, human society and the economies of all the countries in the world faced and continue to face increasingly accelerated, amplified, diverse and divergent economic, social, political and technological trends and developments, among which three so-called megatrends stand out for intensity and persistence: digitization and automation of production, greening of economies and global economic power shifts. Considering such issues, the paper focuses on a brief analysis of how the green transition affects the business sector (enterprises) in the EU countries, with a focus on Romania - an EU member state that registers a relatively low level of penetration of the circular economy. Indicators of the green economy and eco-innovation and referring to the economic dimension of the circular economy, were used for the analysis. The results show that the EU27 economies generally are leaders in most of the aspects concerning the greening of economies and their business sectors, but Romania reveal certain relative delays of the local business sector in moving towards production and business development methods characteristic of the ecological economy.

Abstract
Development and innovation in the digital technologies impact the whole society, communications, finances, trade, education and health services, business patterns and the entire value-added channel.
The increase in the speed of digitization and its expansion within businesses leads to significant changes, both regarding the human capital and the way work and place of work are organized, with high impacts on skills, labor standards, human welfare and sustainable development of countries. Digitization involves changes not only in the human capital, but in the organizational one as well, so that for each euro invested in physical capital (hardware) some additional 10 euros have to be invested in intangible activities, especially in the human and organizational capital (Brynjolfsson and McAfee, 2014).
The paper aims to analyse the impacts of digitization on human capital in the EU economies, also considering the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that has speeded up the digitization process in the EU countries. Both the useful aspects and the challenges determined by the new requirements regarding the skills necessary to human capital are emphasized, as well as the efforts included in the EU programs dedicated to such issues, considering that 42% of the European citizens do not possess basic digital skills and 37% of labor force does not possess adequate digital skills. Finally, some econometric aspects regarding the relationship between welfare and population's digital skills are revealed, as well as conclusions on further research and directions for action.

In the European Union, one of the primary goals of integration is the convergence of the regional income per capita (and of other significant socio-economic indicators), and hence, how to generate a process of convergence. In the economic literature, theories of convergence and divergence examine the reasons for diminishing or increasing the disparities between the rich and the poor re¬gions, and in the case of divergence, explain the persistence of such disparities. In particular, the real convergence approaches are connected to the study of long-term economic growth, economic development and the dynamics of complex economic sectors with high economic and social impacts, and also to the supporting/unsporting institutions and economic mechanisms (market structure, distribution of economic results). Concomitantly, the structural convergence has deserved less attention; although it is an important process for both building and functioning of the single economic and monetary area and for the development of the Member States and their regions. Studies have found that there is a correlation between structural convergence and income (real) convergence, though the findings differ in what regards the strength and direction of such a connection. Starting from the concepts of real and structural convergence, the paper presents an analysis of the real and structural convergence processes in the Romanian counties during the pre-accession and post-accession periods, based on specific indicators (GDP per capita, gross speed of convergence, variation coefficient, gross labor productivity, gross productivity growth rate). Also, with the help of real convergence indices and structural coefficients, the presence and evolution of the relationship between real and structural convergence at sub-regional level is revealed. The results show that the analyzed convergence processes had different speeds in Romania, and that counties have adapted differently to the new economic environment of the EU single market, conditional on their pre-accession development level. The counties which during the pre-accession period recorded good performances have usually strengthened their positions after the EU accession, while the counties with lower performances generally revealed slower growth and convergence, despite recording faster growth rates over certain short periods. Especially regarding productivity convergence, the situation is worrisome for the poorest counties of Romania, but also for some of the counties with higher development level. The real convergence was generally aligned with the structural convergence in the Romanian counties, but again only the most developed counties recorded post-accession progresses in both the convergence processes. Such results are in line with the findings of other studies on the economic and structural convergence of the Member States and/or their regions, but also reveal the sub-regional peculiarities of the catching up and development processes going on in the Romanian economy, and call for more effective implementation of the national and EU development policies at all levels.

The revised Lisbon Strategy has decided upon an integrated programme of policy reforms envisaging the labor market in the context of globalization, demographic changes and fast technological progress, transposed into the integrated guidelines. Such reforms aimed at increasing the employment rates, at improving work quality and labor productivity and social and territorial cohesion; in other words, at updating and upgrading the European labor markets. In order to reach such aims, the flexicurity concept is increasingly considered and employed as a key strategic framework. Flexicurity itself may be defined as an integrated strategy aiming to improve both the labor market flexibility and job security, implying successful switching between educational system and labor market, between jobs, between unemployment and inactivity and employment, and between job and retirement. We propose a possible assessment of the perormances of the flexicurity policies by using certain composite indicators that allow for a multidimensional appraisal of flexicurity in the EU countries, providing also elements for comparison between the EU countries and regions (especially the new member states and their regions).

In the context of current economic and financial crisis a comparative analysis of the main indices of economic and social performance of the EU member states is necessary. In such line of argument, the authors propose, as novelty, an economic power-economic performance matrix as a methodological instrument for monitoring significant discontinuities in the development of the EU member states, able to provide consistent information about some of the threats against the EU economic sustainability. The core idea is to use integrating criteria able to reveal in a clear manner the results of the common efforts of governments, businesses and civil society aiming to improve the economic and social performance of the 27 EU countries. Developing their previous research, the authors propose a model based on 16 criteria grouped into 6 domains, selected on the basis of thorough analyses of the main medium-term determinants of a country's economic and social performance (referring to overall economic performance, structure of economy, foreign trade efficiency, human development policies, informational society and tourism incomes, as proxy for infrastructure development). The economic power-economic performance matrix built on the basis of such a model for all the EU countries revealed a single net leader, both in terms of economic power and economic performance (Germany), but also high significant negative discrepancies between economic power and economic performance, both among the countries with higher economic power (United Kingdom, Italy, Spain) and among the countries with lower economic power (Greece and Romania).

Development gaps are a common feature throughout the regions of the European Union, and Romania is no exception. Despite all the political and financial efforts, the convergence process is lengthy and complex, and the gaps with the deepest economic and social roots are the most difficult to be dealt with. Using a broad range of indicators and statistical and econometric techniques, the authors present a detailed picture of the development gaps and their dynamics in the Sud Muntenia region of Romania. The results show the presence of an overall development process in the region and its counties, accelerated after the accession of Romania to the European Union, but also hit by the global crisis. The inter-county and intra-county economic and social imbalances however persist, and the inadequate use of territorial resources is still an issue to be addressed by the regional and local government authorities and the private actors. Policy recommendations are proposed to address the challenges and threats to the balanced development of the Sud Muntenia region of Romania, especially considering the significant changes in the implementation of the regional development policy envisaged by the Romanian government in the very near future.