A GDP plus of 2.5 percent would no longer be valid with the fourth lockdown, says Christoph Badelt in “ZiB 2”. The labor market remains a problem even after the economy has opened up, the rest of them are rising “quickly and steeply”.
Despite the continuation of the current corona lockdown, the head of the Economic Research Institute (Wifo), Christoph Badelt, does not currently consider economic growth of 2.5 percent in the full year 2021 to be at risk. “The forecast is still just valid – but should another lockdown come, then the forecast can no longer be kept for the full year,” he said Tuesday evening in the ORF news program “ZiB2”.
“If we were to get a fourth lockdown, the year 2021 can certainly no longer be closed with a positive growth rate,” said Badelt.
Wifo lowered its forecast for the domestic gross domestic product (GDP) from 4.5 to 2.5 percent in December. In 2020, the Austrian economy shrank by around 7.5 percent. “The fact is, locking up is driving the growth rate down.”
According to the first flash estimate by the EU statistics agency Eurostat for the economic slump in the fourth quarter of 2020, Badelt wanted to put into perspective the very poor performance of Austria in a European comparison: “We had a very high plus of over 12 percent in the third quarter, so it is clear that one then falls down harder. “
According to Eurostat, the domestic economy slumped by 4.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2020 compared to the third quarter of the year – that was by far the most negative value in a country comparison. The second worst hit was Italy's economy, down 2 percent. Even compared to the fourth quarter of 2019, Austria was pretty much the weakest – with a GDP decline of 7.8 percent. Only Spain was worse with minus 9.1 percent; Italy was slightly better than Austria with minus 6.6 percent.
“That can certainly not only be explained with tourism, but that we have a relatively high level of pessimism in Austria,” explained the Wifo boss. Consumption only picked up briefly in summer, and a lot is being saved.
The economic researcher expects that the economy will “rise rapidly and steeply” after the lockdown – with the exception of the labor market. The old level should not be reached that quickly. “I think there will be some left over,” said Badelt, referring to the high unemployment figures. A good labor market policy with qualification measures is required here.
Insolvencies as a result of the corona crisis are likely to “affect small businesses in particular”. At the same time, however, there will also be numerous start-ups. “I believe that there will be a massive upswing once the disease is contained,” said the Wifo boss.
