According to IMF data, the eurozone economy, measured in dollars, has grown by around 6% since 2008, compared to 82% in the North American country.
The purchasing power of Europeans has been declining, so the citizens of the Old Continent they are getting poorer compared to those who live on the other side of the ocean, reports The Wall Street Journal citing data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Thus, recent analyzes show that private consumption in the euro area has fallen by around 1% since the end of 2019 after adjusting for inflation. In the United States, on the other hand, the figure has increased by almost 9%.
In 2008, the European Union and the US each accounted for a quarter of all global consumer spending. At the moment, The EU It represents only 18% of that total, compared to 28% corresponding to the North American country.
According to the agency, inflation-adjusted wages have fallen by around 3% since 2019 in Germany, 3.5% in Italy and Spain and 6% in Greece. Meanwhile, real wages in the United States have increased by about 6% in the same period.
The newspaper stresses that the economic difficulties have reached “far in the middle classes”, while spending on high-end groceries has also been affected. For example, the Germans they consumed 52 kilos of meat per person in 2022, around 8% less than the previous year and the lowest level since calculations began in 1989.
“The French eat less foie gras”
“The French eat less foie gras and drink less red wine. The Spanish reduce their consumption of olive oil”, while the prices of pasta, the favorite staple in Italy, have risen “more than twice the national inflation rate,” the article notes. “In Germany, meat and milk consumption has fallen to its lowest level in three decades and the once-booming market for organic food has collapsed,” he adds.
By the latest indices, Europe entered a recession at the start of the year, sharpening the sense of relative economic, political and military decline that emerged in the 2000s.
WSJ explains this dynamic with The aging of the populationwho prefers free time and job security to income, in addition to the consequences of the covid-19 pandemic and the protracted crisis in Ukrainewhich went as far as disrupting global supply chains, skyrocketing energy and food prices.
According to data from the International Monetary Fund, the eurozone economy, measured in dollars, has grown by around 6% since 2008, compared to 82% in the US.
Another study carried out this month by the European Center for International Political Economy, an independent think tank based in Brussels, a middle country in the EU bloc. is poorer per capita than any US stateexcept Idaho and Mississippi.
Specialists estimate that, if the current trend continues, in 2035 the difference between the per capita economic production of the North American country and the EU will be as great as the one that exists today between Japan and Ecuador.
Source: RT
