After five years of work at every level to correct the fiscal, financial and external imbalances that led to the crisis, and to reinforce fiscal and financial institutions, the Euro Area is beginning to show signs of recovery. But, despite these positive signs, growth is still weak and uneven.

Despite the harsh external economic environment, Germany has managed to reduce unemployment significantly while buttressing the long-term sustainability of its public finances. Drawing on the expertise and experience of OECD member countries, this report sets out key policy priorities to boost productivity growth and social inclusion.

The Norwegian economy is performing well, generating inclusive growth, strong social mobility and low unemployment. But to ensure future prosperity, Norway must continue with growth-enhancing reforms while ensuring financial stability, according to the OECD’s latest Economic Survey of Norway.

A broad agenda of reforms in four areas – labour markets, education, product markets and innovation – should strengthen Poland’s economy and allow it to continue its path of convergence towards the income levels of the more affluent OECD economies, said Angel Gurría during a seminar in Warsaw.

Poland’s economic performance has been impressive over the past 15 years, but further reforms are now needed to put the economy firmly back on track for stronger and sustainable growth, according to the OECD’s latest Economic Survey of Poland.

Action taken by many European countries to return their public finances to health are beginning to pay off, says the OECD. The Euro area economies which emerged from the crisis with serious current account deficits are now in surplus. Debt-to-GDP ratios are stabilising and market tensions have abated.

This paper provides an assessment of how households’ income has fared compared with GDP. While the prime focus is on incomes around the median, attention is paid also to the bottom of the income distribution.

Industrial specialization has important implications for economic performance; therefore, understanding its determinants is of key policy relevance.

The Netherlands is gradually emerging from a double-dip recession with strengthened public finances and reforms on track to improve the labour and housing markets and the health care and pension systems. These reforms are paying off, says the OECD. Growth is expected to reach 1% this year and 1.3% in 2015.

Danish productivity has grown only weakly over the past two decades, both historically and in relation to other countries, despite sound policies and institutions. Denmark needs to continue its efforts to reap the benefits of globalisation, which would contribute to invigorating productivity growth.

Over the past decade, the growth potential of the Hungarian economy has declined substantially. Trend productivity has ceased to increase, and investment has fallen to historically low levels.

Poland’s productivity has grown strongly over the past decade, and efforts to reduce the regulatory burden have been significant. Despite impressive progress, product market regulation remains more burdensome than in most OECD countries, partly due to the importance of red tape and the level of state involvement in the economy.

Canada has experienced solid economic growth since the global crisis, allowing it to reverse recession-induced job losses and put federal public finances on a sound footing, says the OECD. Growth is expected to accelerate from 2.5% this year to 2.7% in 2015.

Enhancing the productivity and competitiveness of the French economy will demand action on innovation and research, competition, education and vocational training, as well as on the functioning of the labour market, on public-sector efficiency, and on fiscal policy.

Having been hit hard by the global crisis, the Portuguese government has taken action to put its economy back on track, and to correct external and budgetary imbalances. This document highlights some key priorities to support economic growth and competitiveness through further productivity-enhancing structural reforms.

This paper provides a framework for comparing a defined benefit (DB) and a defined contribution (DC) point schemes, which are both pay-as-you go (PAYG) financed.

Demographic developments are unfavourable for the financing of pension schemes in most OECD countries, implying continued growth in pension expenditure in virtually all OECD countries. This paper examines the vulnerability of pension systems, with an emphasis on financial sustainability and adequacy.

Demand for jobs, characterized by skill type and industry of employment, is driven by changes in technology, trade and consumption. Using structural decomposition analysis, we study the relative importance of these drivers for the period 1995-2008.

Economists have traditionally been very cautious when studying the interaction between employment and health because of the two-way causal relationship between these two variables: health status influences the probability of being employed and, at the same time, working affects the health status.

The OECD does not see deflation taking hold in the euro area, but the risk has risen.

Modest global economic forecasts, continuing high unemployment, and downshifts in potential output,should spur governments with a greater sense of urgency to fully employ monetary, fiscal and structural policy levers to support growth, notably in Europe, according to the OECD’s latest Economic Outlook.

Mexico now has the chance to dramatically boost growth rates and resume convergence of its living standards towards those of advanced economies, reduce pervasive labour market informality and drive down high rates of poverty and income inequality.

Changes to Italy’s political and institutional systems are crucial to ensuring the success of ambitious reforms currently underway to boost economic growth and raise living standards, according to a new OECD report.

Cambiare il quadro politico-istituzionale in Italia è fondamentale per garantire che le ambiziose riforme in corso rilancino la crescita e aumentino la qualità della vita, secondo un nuovo rapporto dell’OCSE.

Tunisia has made great strides since 2011 towards greater inclusivity and fairness in its political system, based on the rule of law, transparency and good governance.

New global trend such as jobless growth, a rising youth population and resource scarcity threaten to undo much of the progress of recent decades in securing people’s ability to make a living, according to a new report by the OECD Development Centre launched in Paris today at the OECD Global Forum on Development.

This paper reviews different explanations for apparent underinvestment in energy efficiency that have been put forward in the literature. It also provides new evidence regarding barriers to investment in energy efficiency based on the OECD Survey on Household Environmental Behaviour and Attitudes.

Colombia is one of the most unequal countries in Latin America. The high level of informality in the labour market and many characteristics of the pension system leave many elderly in poverty. Only formal-sector employees earning more than the relatively high minimum wage are covered.

This paper compares two competing empirical specifications across all OECD economies, where competing specifications correspond to the 'former' and 'new' specification for deriving measures of the unemployment gap which underlie the OECD’s Economic Outlook projections.

Both educational attainment and skills, as measured in the OECD Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), are high in Sweden. They are not perfect substitutes, but both are to some degree necessary for successfully integrating in the Swedish labour market.

The New Zealand economy has performed well in recent years, but bottlenecks in housing and urban infrastructure, inequalities in living standards and rising environmental pressures all pose challenges for sustaining robust growth and high levels of well-being over the long term, according to the OECD’s latest Economic Survey of New Zealand.

The current low interest rate environment poses a significant risk for the long-term financial viability of pension funds and insurance companies, as they seek to generate sufficient returns to meet promises, according to a new OECD report.

Important reforms have been implemented which raised credibility of Slovenia in the financial markets and boosted confidence. But economic recovery has been sluggish, many people are unemployed and living standards still remain below the pre-crisis levels.

In the years before the economic crisis, Portugal had low growth, a decline in export competitiveness and rising imbalances that included a large current account deficit and a strong expansion of the non-tradable sector. Strengthening export performance is therefore one of the principal challenges for Portugal.

Over the past decade, France has substantially eased the burden of anti competitive regulations and effectively enforced competition law against anti-competitive practices.

Switzerland’s recent economic performance has been impressive, but with growth now slowing new reforms will be necessary to maintain high levels of prosperity and ensure future well-being, according to the latest OECD Economic Survey of Switzerland.

This is the first paper that comprehensively documents the profiles of the 1% highest paid employees across 18 European countries. The data come from the largest harmonised source available, an employer-based survey that covers the labour income of 10 million employees, excluding the self-employed.

This paper investigates the impact of policies and institutions on health expenditures for a large panel of OECD countries for the period 2000-10.

Using a gravity model of bilateral trade in manufacturing industries for selected OECD and BRIICS countries over 1990s-2000s, this paper studies how exports are related to national environmental policies.

Countries that implement stringent environmental policies do not lose export competitiveness when compared against countries with more moderate regulations, according to a new OECD study that examines trade in manufactured goods between advanced and emerging economies.

Promoting competition to enhance productivity at the firm level and resulting income and growth improvement and a lower cost of living is an important economic and social challenge in Israel.

Israel is a young country with still dynamic population growth, but it is already beginning to face the consequences of population ageing.

Boosting investment in infrastructure and logistics, further liberalising the network industries, improving investment in human and knowledge-based capital to allow upgrading in the global value chains will be essential to enhance export performance.

The European economy is gradually recovering but further policy action will be required to address unresolved legacies of the global economic crisis that are weighing on growth and major new concerns that have emerged, according to two new OECD reports.

The German economy has steadily recovered from the 2008 global crisis. Thanks to past reforms, the labour market has proved strong and export performance has been impressive.

To support the recovery, structural reforms that yield short-run as well as long-run gains should be prioritised.

Canada’s productivity performance has lagged that of many other OECD countries, despite some improvement in recent years.

Weak trade growth and financial distortions are exacerbating slow global economic growth, according to the OECD’s latest Interim Economic Outlook.

Given the secular decline in productivity growth and the persistent weakness of the economic recovery in many advanced economies, increased attention is being paid to the potential role of structural reforms for restoring economic growth.

The post-crisis recovery in entrepreneurial activity remains mixed across countries, but new data released today by the OECD provides tentative signs of a turning point, with trends in enterprise creation rates pointing upwards in most economies.