More than a quarter of adults in the United Kingdom have low basic skills, which has a negative impact on career prospects, job quality and productivity growth.

Composite leading indicators continue to point to stable growth momentum in the OECD area

Stable growth momentum in the OECD area

This paper investigates if higher public spending in education and better teacher qualifications are related to student’s performance, using data from Saber 11, a national standardized test conducted by Instituto Colombiano para la Evaluación de la Educación.

A favourable growth outlook offers Chile an opportunity to address its low productivity levels compared to other advanced economies, improve access to quality jobs and take steps to reduce its persistently high inequality, according to a new OECD report.

Chile has been one of the fastest-growing economies in the OECD in recent decades. Sound macroeconomic management, bold structural reforms, such as trade and investment liberalisation, and buoyant natural-resource sectors, supported fast convergence in living standards.However, progress has slowed: declining productivity gains are limiting prospects for rising incomes and better-quality jobs; and inequality remains stubbornly high.

The Irish economy is booming and is expected to continue expanding at healthy rates over the next few years.

Inequality and relative poverty in Israel remain high, particularly among Arab-Israelis and Haredim (Ultra-Orthodox).x

Rapid technological change – from digitalisation to artificial intelligence, 3D printing and nanomaterials – is transforming the way goods and services are produced and consumed. It will have profound implications for the dynamics of productivity, jobs, investment and trade over the next 10 to 15 years.

Declining inflation in many countries over the past few decades at the same time as rising global competition has led to a debate on the importance of globalisation for domestic inflation. This paper explores the implications of global value chain (GVC) integration and market contestability for inflation using a range of industry-level and micro-data sources.

Over the last decades Argentina’s living standards have lost ground relative to other developed and emerging economies. Putting Argentina on a path to stronger, inclusive and job-rich growth requires boosting productivity and strengthening investment through wide-ranging structural reforms.

What is the relevant perspective for evaluating people’s living standards in advanced countries? According to standard assessments of inequality it is fellow citizens within the country.

This paper compares Finland’s benefit system with two benefit reform scenarios: a uniform benefit for all ("basic income") and a universal tapering rule ("universal credit").

OECD CLIs point to stable growth momentum in the OECD area

Costa Rica has made impressive economic and social progress in recent years, with robust economic growth facilitating near-universal access to education, health care and pensions.

Markets and commentators are speculating that there may be a sustained pick-up in inflation in the United States, after years of subdued price pressures. Along with continued solid US jobs growth and low unemployment, there are tentative signs of higher wage growth and the fiscal stimulus will also boost short-term growth. Global growth is also getting stronger.

The Nordics are rightly renowned for being inclusive societies with low inequality compared to other OECD countries. However, some of the largest inequality increases over the past few decades took place in Sweden, Finland and Denmark.

La economía de Costa Rica es sólida y continúa convergiendo hacia los niveles de vida de los países miembros de la OCDE.

Greece’s recovery from deep economic depression is finally gaining traction, according to the OECD. Economic growth has started to pick up led by a rise in exports while labour market reforms have improved competitiveness and are helping to create jobs.

OECD CLIs continue to point to stable growth momentum in the OECD area

The analysis suggests that countries with a counter-cyclical fiscal stance typically have a public spending structure that is more supportive of inclusive growth.

Over the past decade, limited structural reform and capital investment have held back productivity growth and improvements in well-being, and Thailand has lost ground vis-à-vis regional comparators.

Mr. Angel Gurría, Secretary-General of the OECD, will be in Berlin on 11-12 June 2018 to attend a meeting with Chancellor Merkel and Heads of International Organisations. While in Berlin, the Secretary-General will also present the 2018 OECD Economic Survey of Germany.

Global trade imbalances narrowed in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. They have remained at a lower level but are still of concern to policy makers because of the risks they pose to individual economies, as well as globally.

Stable growth momentum in the OECD area

In the past decade, overdose deaths have surged, particularly as (illicit) synthetic opioids have become more available. Opioid-related deaths touch urban and rural communities alike and are spreading to affect all demographic groups.

With still large government debt and interest payments in many OECD countries, actively adjusting debt maturity can help to minimise debt servicing costs.

Consecutive years of primary deficits have led to mounting public debt of almost 50% of GDP, one of the fastest increases in Latin America over the last decade.

Owing to past structural reforms, Costa Rica has enjoyed robust GDP growth and productivity levels are gradually converging towards the OECD average.

Lithuania’s economy has grown faster than most other OECD economies over the past 10 years, unemployment continues to fall and public finances have stabilised after a long period of deficits and rising debt.

Stable growth momentum in the OECD area

Structural Policy Indicators Database for Economic Research (SPIDER)

This paper presents country-specific effects of structural reforms. It discusses how sizeable and interesting country-specific effects can be identified in a panel setting by conditioning the impact of individual policies on their own level or on the stance of other policies and institutions.

Turkey’s business sector exhibits one of the highest investment rates among OECD countries.

Canada is one of the OECD economies delivering the best outcomes for its citizens, especially in regards to self-reported well-being, personal security and health status. Canada is also undertaking several programmes to foster inclusive growth – with respect to childcare benefits, gender equality and social housing.

Growth, driven by both internal and external demand, has been accelerating since 2013 and at 4.6% in 2017 it was more balanced than in previous years. Household consumption is supported by income growth, a declining savings rate as confidence is high, and by rising credit.

The euro area sovereign debt crisis highlighted important weaknesses in the euro area design. Fiscal policy did not build sufficient buffers before the crisis, which forced some countries to tighten fiscal policy too rapidly during the downturn to restore market confidence in sovereign borrowing.

This paper investigates the effect of structural characteristics on debt limits of middle income countries.

This paper uses a novel data set of digital technology usage covering 25 industries in 25 European countries over the 2010-16 period to explore the drivers of digital adoption across two broad sets of digital technologies by firms, cloud computing and back or front office integration.

The current Canadian government has declared itself feminist and has taken a number of steps to improve labour market outcomes for women. In terms of employment and labour force participation, Canadian women do much better than the OECD average.

Governments today need to balance the policy goals of boosting economic growth and improving equity when making budget decisions. How can public spending choices promote inclusive growth? What can be learned from previous spending decisions in times of crisis?

The euro area sovereign debt crisis has exposed important flaws in the design of the Economic and Monetary Union, especially when it comes to dealing with macroeconomic shocks.

The paper examines the possible design and macroeconomic stabilisation properties of a euro area unemployment benefits re-insurance scheme using annual historical data from 2000 to 2016.

This paper exploits a new database that is unique in its scale and scope containing detailed information on over two million projects carried out by one million firms that benefited from the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the Cohesion Fund in 25 EU member countries during the multi-annual financial framework 2007-2013.

Tentative signs of easing growth momentum in the OECD area

This paper compares supply and demand to assess to what extent there can be a market for GDP-linked bonds (GLBs).

Stronger cross-border economic and financial integration implies that macroeconomic shocks in one country are increasingly likely to spill over into other economies.

4-5 September 2018, Paris - The OECD Blockchain Policy Forum on "Distributed Ledgers: Opportunities and Challenges" was the first major international conference to take stock of blockchain’s impacts across the full range of government activities and public priorities.

Over the past two decades, real median wage growth in many OECD countries has decoupled from labour productivity growth, partly reflecting declines in labour income shares.

Easing growth momentum in the OECD area