SLOVAKIA has been told by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) how to boost economic growth. Structural reforms and consolidation could help the country to increase growth by more than one fifth compared to the government’s current, less ambitious approach, the OECD found, as reported by the Hospodárske Noviny daily on November 13.
Slovakia should focus on loosening market regulation, increasing the number of economically active inhabitants and also on lowering the tax burden on employees, according to the OECD analysis quoted by the daily.
“The government has prepared a package of consolidation measures that don’t have such a negative impact on economic growth as the consolidation [measures] of the previous government in 2011,” Finance Ministry spokesperson Radko Kuruc told Hospodárske Noviny.
The OECD also issued a long-term prognosis that compares GDP per citizen in its member states, according to which Slovakia should start catching up with western countries as early as this year, when it is forecast to produce €600 more per capita than Portugal – making it the first “old” EU member that Slovakia overtakes, the daily wrote.
By 2030, Slovakia should be better off than Italy (and Israel) and is expected to beat even France by 2060, according to the OECD.
