How can Greece be competitive when the taxation system changes once a year, liquidity is a rarity, capital controls tie the hands of entrepreneurs and investors and the tedious negotiations with international creditors undermines the atmosphere in the Greek economy? The answer is simple: it can’t. In the Swiss-based International Institute for Management Development (IMD) Competitiveness report for 2017, Greece dropped to position 57th. The IMF report studied 63 countries.
Greece has continued its downward course in the rankings, losing one more spot in 2017, after dropping six ranks last year – a reflection of the insecurity and investment slowdown. The report presents data on 63 economies based on 260 indicators.
In terms of competitiveness, Greece ranked above Venezuela, Ukraine, Brazil, Mongolia and Argentina, and below Kazakhstan (32), Chile (35), Philippines (41), Indonesia (42), South Africa (53), Bulgaria (49) and Romania (50).
According to the IMD report, the Greek economy is showing the poorest performance in “Home Economy” now ranked 60th from 54th, “International Trade” now 40th from 34th, and “Tax Policy” now 59th from 55th.
Greece’s deteriorating position is also attributed to poor performance in the categories of “Economic Efficiency”, which dropped three rankings from last year to 61, “Government Efficiency” and “Infrastructure”.
According to the Federation of Industries of Northern Greece (FING), Greece’s position on the competitive listing is a message to the government to step up efforts towards the revival of the Greek economy and to design appropriate policies which will boost competitiveness of local businesses. This, FING says, can be achieved by accelerating privatization processes, boosting liquidity for private sector enterprises, planning and implementing an economic development program to ensure the sustainability of public finances, introducing measures that will effectively address the migration problem, and increasing domestic investment via Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs).
Global Competitiveness Report
Greece scored 4 points out of 7 on the 2016-2017 Global Competitiveness Report published by the World Economic Forum. Competitiveness Index in Greece averaged 4.00 Points from 2007 until 2017, reaching an all time high of 4.12 Points in 2007 and a record low of 3.86 Points in 2013.
| Competitiveness Index | 4.00 | 4.02 | 4.12 | 3.86 |
| Business Confidence | 93.20 | 94.90 | 120.10 | 75.20 |
| Competitiveness Rank | 86.00 | 81.00 | 96.00 | 61.00 |
| Ease of Doing Business | 61.00 | 58.00 | 109.00 | 58.00 |
| Corruption Rank | 69.00 | 58.00 | 94.00 | 25.00 |
The most recent 2016-2017 edition of Global Competitiveness Report assesses 138 economies. The report is made up of over 110 variables, of which two thirds come from the Executive Opinion Survey representing the sample of business leaders, and one third comes from publicly available sources such as the United Nations.
The variables are organized into twelve pillars with the most important including: institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic framework, health and primary education and higher education and training. The GCI score varies between 1 and 7 scale, higher average score means higher degree of competitiveness. This page provides the latest reported value for – Greece Competitiveness Index – plus previous releases, historical high and low, short-term forecast and long-term prediction, economic calendar, survey consensus and news. Greece Competitiveness Index – actual data, historical chart and calendar of releases – was last updated on June of 2017.
PS I hope all these reports included the increase in self-employed and freelancer social security contribution… 😛
