The Czech Republic (CR), Slovakia and Austria share many common economic characteristics. These include significant socio-cultural similarities, common grouping in the middle third of European countries ranked according to the size of their economies, and a strong link to the German economy. However, there are also significant differences, especially in the field of economic advancement.
All these features appear in a new publication from the Czech Statistical Office (CSO) entitled Comparative analysis of the economic development of the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Austria. It follows the development of the three economies since the 1990s, focusing especially on changes in the period of enlargement of the EU and comparing the impact of the economic crisis since 2009.
Will we overtake Austria?
"Let's try to identify what might have happened behind the strong growth of the Slovak economy, why the Czech economy didn't manage to utilise the full potential that was offered to it as a very open economy - like the Slovak - in connection with the opening up of the European market. Let's identify the main differences and try to answer the question to what extent the cause of the differences lies in economic policies and how real the possibility of significant approximation of the Czech and Slovak economic levels to Austria is," says the author of the publication, Drahomíra Dubská.
The publication is divided into five parts:
1. Summary
2. Starting positions in the field of economic advancement
3. Economic performance of the CR, Slovakia and Austria according to the development of GDP
4. Reasons for the growth of the economies of the CR, Slovakia and Austria according to the structure of expenditure to GDP and its development
5. Weights of individual sectors in the economies of the CR, Slovakia and Austria according to gross value added
Individual sections and the entire publication are available online at the CSO website here (in Czech).
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