This Country Focus shows that some simple reserve adequacy measures (particularly based on external debt indices) – although suffering from a number of drawbacks – seem to be sound indicators of the largest vulnerabilities within the CEE8 region. Nevertheless, the analysis of...

Unemployment has fallen considerably during the recent period of record growth in the Czech economy. This has ended a long period of relatively jobless growth during which GDP was driven by advances in productivity and capital deepening rather than rises in employment. This country focus...

In recent years, Slovakia has introduced wide-ranging reforms in the tax, pension, social and health care systems. These reforms have increased incentives to work, to create jobs and to invest, and have thus fostered growth and economic catching-up. The supply-side driven growth has so far...