Suchergebnisse

Employment and activity rates in the new EU Member States (NMS) declined significantly up to the early 2000s and started to increase along with strong GDP growth thereafter. Job losses following the outbreak of the economic and financial crisis varied substantially across countries and have not been offset yet. Overall, the low-educated and the young people are very disadvantaged on the NMS labour markets. With the exception of Poland and Slovenia, non-standard types of employment are uncommon in the NMS, following the pattern of Southern EU countries. Employment protection legislation has been adjusted to 'European standards' in the entire region. Union density and consequently the impact of trade unions on wage setting and employment in the NMS fell dramatically. In all NMS unemployment insurance schemes as well as minimum wage regulations were introduced at the beginning of the 1990s, but are less generous than in the EU-15.

The paper covers seven transition countries the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Romania. Section 1 describes the changing patterns of value added by broad sector, showing the process of de-agrarization, de?industrialization and tertiarization which the CEECs have undergone over the transition period and providing an overview of inter-country differences. Section 2 examines the changes in employment patterns that have evolved during the transition period. Further it compares the employment patterns in the European Union with those in the CEECs and shows where there is an employment absorption potential in the individual transition countries. Section 3 deals in detail with the developments in the CEECs' services sector and its individual segments and again compares these with the EU countries. Section 4 analyses the regional dimension of the services sector in the CEE economies. Section 5 refers to the impact of FDI on the development of the services sector (especially the market services sector) and section 6 gives an overview of the tertiarization process country by country. Section 7 offers some concluding remarks.

Eine Analyse der kroatischen Wirtschaft und abgeleitete Politikempfehlungen auf nationaler und EU-Ebene Ziel der Studie ist die Ausarbeitung von Politikempfehlungen, die dabei helfen sollen, die kroatische Wirtschaft positiv zu stimulieren und der Bevölkerung im Land eine langfristige Perspektive zu geben. Dabei soll insbesondere analysiert werden, welchen Beitrag Österreich und die EU zur Abfederung etwaiger Effekte auf den kroatischen und österreichischen Arbeitsmarkt leisten können, die bei Auslaufen der Übergangsregelungen für die Beschäftigung von kroatischen Arbeitskräften in Österreich, die bis längstens 30.06.2020 in Anspruch genommen werden können, zu erwarten sind. ; An Analysis of the Croatian Economy and Resulting Policy Recommendations at National and EU Level The aim of the study is to develop policy recommendations that are supportive of providing a positive stimulus to the Croatian economy and offering a long-term perspective to the population in the country. In particular, it is analysed which contributions Austria and the EU can make to mitigate potential negative effects that may arise upon the expiration (by 30 June 2020 at the latest) of the transitional arrangements for employing Croatian citizens in Austria.

Having reached a peak in 2002, Croatia's GDP growth lost momentum thereafter due to restrictive economic policy measures prompted by rising external and internal imbalances. The current account deficits, averaging 6-7% of the country's GDP over the past few years, were primarily the consequence of high and growing imbalances in commodity trade which could only be partly offset by earnings from services. Thus, these deficits had to be mainly financed by rising foreign debt, which has been identified as the main threat to macroeconomic stability. In 2004 Croatia, together with Latvia and Estonia, was the most indebted country as compared with the new EU member states and other Southeast European countries. At the beginning of 2005 the World Bank downgraded Croatia to a ¿severely indebted middle-income country'. In addition, Croatia has one of the largest public sectors if compared to the new EU member states or the EU-15, excepting Denmark, France and Sweden. As regards the expenditure structure, the public sector still spends a high portion on public sector wages and salaries, and on subsidies and transfers, as compared to the new EU member states. The high budgetary expenditures have been accompanied by relatively high fiscal deficits. This is especially true for the period following the crisis of the late 1990s. Since then, the reform of public spending has become one of the main economic policy issues. The aim is to bring the deficit gradually down to below 3% of GDP by the year 2007. Also, the government is determined to borrow in domestic rather than foreign currencies in order to diminish the risks associated with the exchange rate and interest rate movements. Croatia's public debt has been on a steady increase in absolute and relative terms over the past couple of years. When compared to the new EU member states, only Hungary exhibits a higher portion than Croatia, while all other countries report much lower levels. Indeed, most of the new member states have managed to reduce their public debt levels over the past few years or to keep them stable. The policy to deal with these macroeconomic imbalances adopted by the government and the central bank on the advice from the IMF in recent years is that of 'soft landing'. In sum, the adopted measures should slow down the growth of aggregate demand and thus lead to slower growth of imports and should stabilize the foreign debt to GDP ratio somewhere around 80% (in euro terms). This policy has brought mixed results so far and it is not clear whether continued reliance on it will be sufficient to move the economy to a path of sustainable growth rather than proving to be just a short-term deviation from the unsustainable growth path. Early in 2005, there were worries that policy is in fact overshooting with growth slowing down faster than expected or desired. Later in the year, growth has speeded up, but the current account deficit has also widened. In any case, the policy adjustment measures that have been introduced will have to be supplemented with longer-term changes and eventually with structural reforms. What are the policy alternatives? Croatia's macroeconomic stability is presumed on the stability of its exchange rate. A problem arises when the exchange rate looks like being misaligned, which is indicated by the unsustainable growth of foreign debt. In that case an adjustment of the exchange rate may be appropriate. If the exchange rate adjustment is not possible because of large balance sheet effects, the alternative would be a more aggressive wage policy. This, however, will largely depend on the assertiveness of the government, which is the main risk of this policy alternative. Another possibility would be more supply-side policies, such as significant changes in the tax system. In a number of countries in transition the corporate tax has been decreased quite significantly. It turns out that a policy of low taxation does not cost the budget too much, because the revenues from the corporate income tax are small anyway, but do create an incentive for foreign investors to locate their operations in these tax havens. This is not a measure that by itself would turn the economy around, but could be considered as a supplement for the economic policy and structural reforms that are difficult to implement immediately. The idea would be to increase investments and growth and introduce structural and public sector reforms in a fast growing economy.

The report gives an overview of the overall trends in output and employment in Croatia, and of the country's fiscal and external sectors. It concentrates in more detail on the manufacturing sector and its competitiveness in comparison with developments in other Central, East and Southeast European economies. Finally some economic policy issues specific to Croatia are discussed. The Croatian economy, hit hard by output declines in the 1990s, has not yet recovered to its pre-transition levels. In contrast to the largely successful stabilization of prices and the exchange rate, Croatia's external position has deteriorated considerably over recent years. Gross foreign indebtedness reached a record level in 2003, more than 80% of GDP. A positive role is played by the services sector high surpluses are registered in services trade, and the sector has also a high proportion in the total FDI stock, primarily in the transport and telecom segment. 2002 manufacturing output reached only slightly more than 60% of its 1990 level; the single positive exception was the paper and printing industry. In comparison with the EU and the CEE countries, the output structure of Croatian manufacturing is more similar to the less advanced southern EU countries and also to Bulgaria and Romania. On the EU market Croatian manufacturing has been continuously losing export shares. As Croatia's trade deficit with the EU was growing, the deterioration was observable in most manufacturing branches, pointing to a widespread weakening of the country's international competitiveness. As for exchange-rate and fiscal policies, if increasing risks to macroeconomic stability are to be avoided, a move towards a more flexible exchange rate may still be advisable in order to enhance industrial competitiveness and to allow for a more supportive monetary policy. Further fiscal adjustments would be needed to promote investment and thus increase employment.

Obgleich am Westbalkan in den letzten Jahren ein gewisser Aufholprozess bei der Errichtung von Verkehrsinfrastruktur zu verzeichnen war, bleibt die Eisenbahndichte gering und die Autobahndichte noch geringer. Auch der Nachholbedarf bei Energieinfrastruktur ist substantiell. Die aktuelle Initiative der "Core Network and Priority Projects" im Rahmen des "Berlin-Prozesses" sollte kurz- und mittelfristig Wachstum und Beschäftigung in der Region sichern und längerfristig zu einer wesentlichen Verbesserung der Wettbewerbsfähigkeit am Westbalkan beitragen. So konnte in der Analyse gezeigt werden, dass ein umfassendes Transportinfrastruktur-Investitionspaket von 7,7 Mrd. Euro über einen Zeitraum von 15 Jahren hinweg zu einem zusätzlichen Wachstumsschub von bis zu einem Prozentpunkt jährlich für die sechs Westbalkanländer führen könnte. Etwa 200.000 neue Arbeitsplätze könnten in der Region geschaffen werden.

In the period after the political changes in the year 2000, GDP growth in Serbia was rather rapid and compares favourably with other transition countries in Southeastern Europe. It was driven mainly by the expansion of services, with industrial production and agriculture basically stagnating over the whole period. The labour market effects were similar to those in other countries going through transition employment declined in the public sector and increased in the private sector, with the overall number of employed declining and those unemployed increasing, and also with strong increases in the number of pensioners. The Serbian labour market is characterized by low employment and activity rates, particularly for women and young people. This indicates the weaknesses of the secondary educational system in adapting to the needs of the labour market, but also the obsolete skills of the high percentage of long-term unemployed. In general, the educational attainments of the workforce have changed only marginally over recent years. Labour mobility, as everywhere in Europe, is very low in Serbia. By contrast, Serbia's (outward) migration is very high and remittances constitute an important share of income. Brain drain has become an important issue in recent years though it is hardly a new phenomenon. However, for highly educated people, the relevant labour market is the world labour market. Informal sector employment, which has been traditionally high in Serbia, even increased during the past decade, with a rising share of older workers, better educated persons with secondary education or more, self-employed persons and unpaid family workers. During the current crisis there has been a marked decline in the number of self-employed persons, which is where most informally employed people are to be found. Serbia has not relied on consistent labour market policies to address the low level of employment and high level of unemployment. Some changes are being introduced in the crisis and post-crisis periods, but the effects are uncertain and are yet to be determined in any case. Although spending on passive and active labour market policy measures in Serbia has been growing in the past couple of years, it is still low compared to the EU average but higher than in most other Western Balkan countries. The lion's share of the available budget is spent on passive measures. An important step in order to improve the efficiency of labour market policy measures was made in 2007, when the administration of health insurance was separated from the NES which absorbed much time and efforts in the past. Transition and the current crisis have led to the development of significant structural problems in the labour markets in Serbia. The policies so far have been inadequate as they have been targeting cyclical rather than structural problems. This needs to be changed in the future with significant improvements in the policy design and the institutional support for implementation.

This paper discusses the transition agenda and provides the key economic characteristics of selected Middle East and North Africa countries (MENA) in comparison with selected Central, East and Southeast European countries (CESEE). We intend to identify some regularities in transition processes and to draw policy lessons for MENA countries. Among the key challenges facing the MENA region are job creation, fighting corruption, public sector reforms and trade diversification; the way towards a functioning market economy should not necessarily be as long and controversial as in the CESEE. MENA countries had been implementing market-oriented reforms for more than a decade. Together with free trade agreements concluded with the EU, these reforms have contributed to an increase of FDI inflows. Still, MENA countries have been lagging behind in terms of export performance, competitiveness and restructuring. Numerous impediments to trade and FDI in the MENA region need to be overcome, yet the transition will not require a radical overhaul of the existing system. The sine qua non condition is to achieve high per capita GDP growth. There is no guarantee for success – as illustrated by the experience of CESEE. Moreover, the current global crisis makes policy implementation not easier. If anything, future scenarios must reckon with a slow process of improvements and many backlashes. Transitions and sustainable reforms need to be anchored in a supportive international environment. In the case of many CESEE countries, the EU provided such an anchor. In the case of MENA, such a strong anchor is missing. A newly designed international involvement and especially the strengthened role of the EU will play a crucial role. A comprehensive EU-MENA trade agreement, possibly with an intra-MENA (and Turkey) Customs Union arrangement, would be beneficial to both MENA and the EU.