After 10 years of stagnating and declining growth rates, the economic forecasts for Europe are looking somewhat more optimistic, albeit with a high degree of uncertainty. Growth is stabilising at around 1.5%, unemployment is declining and employment rates seem to be on the rise. However, while this may be an improvement in relation to the 10 previous years of dire forecasts, the number of unemployed remains unacceptably high, now standing at 20 million, and employment levels are stagnating. Seen in absolute terms, therefore, there seems little reason to be optimistic about the economic and social situation in the European Union.
The last seven years of austerity and deregulatory structural reforms have resulted in a lack of GDP growth, a rise in unemployment, damaging low rates of investment (both private and public), stagnating wage growth and cuts in social policy programmes. In other words, the lost potential over the past seven years of misguided policies now means that great efff ...
read more ...After 10 years of stagnating and declining growth rates, the economic forecasts for Europe are looking somewhat more optimistic, albeit with a high degree of uncertainty. Growth is stabilising at around 1.5%, unemployment is declining and employment rates seem to be on the rise. However, while this may be an improvement in relation to the 10 previous years of dire forecasts, the number of unemployed remains unacceptably high, now standing at 20 million, and employment levels are stagnating. Seen in absolute terms, therefore, there seems little reason to be optimistic about the economic and social situation in the European Union.
The last seven years of austerity and deregulatory structural reforms have resulted in a lack of GDP growth, a rise in unemployment, damaging low rates of investment (both private and public), stagnating wage growth and cuts in social policy programmes. In other words, the lost potential over the past seven years of misguided policies now means that great efffforts are needed to engage with the challenges and paradigm shifts emerging as a result of climate change and the digitalisation of the economy.
The challenges and policy recommendations presented in last year’s edition of
Benchmarking working Europe therefore remain pertinent in 2017; in fact, the need for
action is now more urgent than ever, particularly in this climate of crisis that is not just
economic in nature but also social and political. This year will see not only the start of the
UK’s ‘Brexit’ process, but also elections taking place in some of the bigger EU Member States and Donald Trump´s fifirst year as US president leading his ‘America fifirst’ strategy. It is in this political climate that the European institutions are launching several initiatives on the ´future
of Europe´, including the White Paper on the deepening of the EMU, the Five Presidents´
Report on the Future of Europe, and last but not least the European Pillar of Social Rights.
These documents should form the basis for establishing a vision of the future of Europe
which, as declared on several occasions, has social concerns at its heart. As the analysis of Benchmarking working Europe 2017 demonstrates, this concern comes somewhat late, but is still of key importance in order for Europe to lay the foundations for a sustainable and fair society.
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