The INE (National Institute of Statistics) has confirmed on Wednesday that the economy grew by 2024 3.2%. Spain reaffirms as well as the locomotive of Europe, after 2.7% of 2023 and 6.2% of 2022. In fact, the government has already advanced that in 2025 the progress of GDP (gross domestic product) will exceed 2 , 5%. Again, beating all expectations. For example, the last projection for the next year of the IMF, a couple of weeks ago, stayed at 2.3%.
“Spain continues to lead the growth of its partners, with an increase in GDP that is four times higher than that of the Eurozone,” says the Ministry of Economy. According to the same data of national accounting published by the INEgrowth in the fourth quarter was maintained at 0.8%, highlighting the positive evolution of private consumption, with an increase of 1%, and the important acceleration of the investment, with an increase of 2.8%, the largest In the last three years.
With stagnant economic activity in Germany, and with France besieged by uncertainties, Spain is the positive exception in the European Union (EU) and that strength is reflected in the labor market. According to the latest Active Population Survey (EPA) known on Tuesday, with figures from all over 2024, our PAIAS had a year of intense creation of employment, with 468,100 jobs, which represents an increase of 2.19%.
In addition, last year, the reduction of unemployment was especially relevant, which decreased by 265,300 people, so that the unemployment rate fell to 10.6%, the lowest level since the second quarter of 2008. And another exercise more A record of employed people has been broken, with a historical exercise of 21,857,900 people with employment.
President Pedro Sánchez took advantage of the press conference after the Council of Ministers on Tuesday to highlight these data and projections, after closing an agreement with Junts to approve the decree of the social shield that revalues pensions, and that Congress knocked down the week passed in one of the toughest parliamentary defeats of the legislature.
The fragmentation of the Congress does not reduce the macroeconomic solidity of Spain, mainly thanks to “the opening abroad”, with tourism as a motor, but, in addition, with a new strength: the increase exports of other services, of more added value (consulting , related to technology, to transport …).
The progress of GDP also nourishes other axes. One is the arrival of immigrants and their incorporation into the labor market. Another, the economic policies of the latest support exercises to families and companies. Income protection measures – from the public financing of the ERTE in the pandemic, to the rise of the SMI since 2018, through the labor or pension reform – that two things have achieved.
First, structural changes such as reducing temporality in hiring. Second, together with more specific measures, they have managed to alleviate the consequences of the energy and inflation crisis of recent years, promoting consumption and supporting the investment of companies. Finally, the deployment of the European funds of the recovery plan stimulates this last component, although it is still the most delayed since 2019.
Exactly, according to INE data, in the last year, growth has been driven by national demand, with a contribution of 2.8 points to the progress of GDP, higher than one point than the previous year, and the good behavior of the foreign sector, which contributed four tenths to annual growth.
With the moderation of inflation, “employees continue to recover purchasing capacity, with a growth of remuneration per worker with payroll of around 5% year -on -year in recent quarters,” the Ministry of Economy highlights.
The positive macroeconomic data always collide with a fundamental criticism, that the added figures and national accounting hide stories of precariousness and vulnerability, and that do not measure the evolution of the well -being of all families and the development of all companies and freelancers.
In an interview granted this weekend to Eldiario.es, the professor and advisor of the Bank of Spain, Carles, explains that “there is a lot of work to do, especially in the elimination of poverty and in the determined approach to the problem of The house. But let’s imagine for a moment that if it had not grown at a rate close to 3% it would not have had the possibility of doing the redistributive policy that has been made in the form of a minimum wage increase (SMI), of aid such as income Vital minimum (IMV) or other public spending plots ”.
In the same vein, in another interview with Eldiario.es, published on Tuesday, the spokesman for Economics and Finance to add in Congress, Carlos Martín Urriza, affects that “the future of the Spanish economy is a brilliant future, always and When the economic policy that has been done so far, and that has had its origin in the Ministry of Labor, we continue to develop and extend it to other areas of government. ”
“And it is an economic policy that is not very complex to understand. What we have done is something very simple, is to raise labor standards, homologate them with Europe in the stability of employment, in the minimum wage, in the management of crises through ERTE, in which there can be no workers who are false freelancers … we will continue to advance in that line with the reduction of working hours, and this elevation of labor standards has done is that capital cannot be profitable in poor working conditions, ”he explains.
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