The European Council in December 2007 established a Reflection Group to identify the challenges that the European Union must face in the following twenty years and review what the answers to this event could be. The group was lead by Felipe Gonzalez and the result of their deliberations were made public 30 months later, just when the international crisis reached that country, causing huge political tensions as a result of the needed economic adjustment that had to be taken to face it and achieve mitigating them.

Leer Mas…

Excessive weight of current expenditure, the inability to sustain high levels of public investments, shortages of foreign direct investment and lack of incentives and security for private investments, a weak institutionalization and rule of the law; deficient infrastructures, narrow minded attitude towards trade and globalization; low competitiveness and productivity among others, are the adverse factors to the imperative of achieving a sustained and high growth and sound public finances.

Leer Mas…

The IMF has just released its mid-year World Economic Outlook, and has upgraded a forecast for the first time in two years. Granted, it expects 2009 to be slightly worse, with global GDP expected to contract 1.4 per cent rather than the 1.3 per cent projected in April. Most of us have already written this year off, so it doesn’t carry that much impact.

Leer Mas…