EU economic recovery to continue while jobless rate at record highs
Print Edition
Europe’s economic recovery will continue into the second half of this year, though at a subdued pace, while unemployment will remain near record highs through next year, the European Commission said yesterday.
The European Union’s economy is expected to grow 0.5 percent over the second half of the year, leaving it flat for the whole year, and expand 1.4 percent in 2014, according to the commission’s fall forecast. Its last predictions, issued in May, had expected an economic decline of 0.1 percent in 2013.
The commission, the EU’s executive arm, also expects the 17-country eurozone to continue its recovery from a protracted recession, from which it emerged in the second quarter. However, over 2013 as a whole, the eurozone is still expected to record a decline of 0.4 percent. For next year, the commission expects 1.1 percent growth, slightly down from its previous forecast of 1.2 percent.
“There are increasing signs that the European economy has reached a turning point,” said the EU’s Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs, Olli Rehn.
Rising business confidence and strengthening domestic demand are expected to underpin the recovery as governments also slow the pace of austerity measures such as spending cuts and tax increases.
“The fiscal consolidation and structural reforms undertaken in Europe have created the basis for recovery,” Rehn added.
The eurozone’s output, however, remains about 3 percent below the level recorded in 2008, when the global financial crisis was entering its most acute phase and Europe’s debt crisis hadn’t yet started, according to the report.
The eurozone’s projected growth will also fail to create many jobs, leaving the unemployment rate at its record high of 12.2 percent this and next year, dropping to 11.8 percent only in 2015, according to the forecast.
Rehn acknowledged: “It is too early to declare victory; unemployment remains at unacceptably high levels.”
The jobless rate for the wider, 28-country EU, which includes members like Britain and Poland who don’t use the euro, is likely to dip from 11.1 percent in 2013 to 11 percent next year.
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