State-owned enterprises (SOEs) are a very important part of the Bulgarian economy. Their revenue in 2015 equals 13% of GDP, but even that number underestimates their economic impact. The data show that the financial position of SOEs as a whole has remained bad in recent years.
Bulgaria’s population is aging and shrinking. Labor Market demands are shifting quickly from low skill to high skill. Twenty percent of Bulgaria’s youth are NEEDS (not in employment or education). Almost 50% of Roma in the country have primary or lower education.
Just a year after the topic of fiscal decentralization briefly entered the public debate in Bulgaria, the political volition for taking actual steps in this direction seems exhausted. The government stifles to a large extent the initiative of local authorities.
What if I told you that the poorest EU member state is a country in which economic populism is more often the rule of a thumb, rather than an exception? Would that surprise you, or would you think it is a fate just deserved by both the Bulgarian public and its government?
There is a profound feeling of injustice rooted deep in the Bulgarian society. This can be clearly seen in international studies that cover topics such as trust in institutions and the rule of law. The same feeling of injustice is responsible for the widespread negative public perceptions towards Bulgarian entrepreneurs.
Back in 2012, Mario Draghi vowed to do “everything in his power” to save the euro. Four years later that promise seems fulfilled – both the recent moves by the ECB and the market reaction that followed suggest that we are reaching the limit of what monetary policy can achieve in the euro area.
We have the pleasure the present you a comparative study that investigates the pensions response of the governments of three CEE countires: Slovakia, Bulgaria and Poland, in an attempt to discuss potential measures, necessary for either financial balancing of the systems or their structural changes. Enjoy your reading!
Although Bulgaria has officially been in a budgetary consolidation phase during the entire 2013-2015 period, public expenditure went out of control on several occasions. Yet again the newly presented medium-term budget framework provides for decreasing deficits, while current expenditures (and thus deficits) are being hiked.
The brief message of the report regarding the effectiveness of the banking supervision in Bulgaria is unambiguous: yes, the supervision has demonstrated weaknesses, and yes, the CCB management has circumvented and violated the regulations and the good banking practices.
Security is the biggest challenge for our economy. To counteract a similar challenge, Israel, for example, is entirely militarized, regardless of the fact that numerous international lobbyist groups assist it, including financially. A country facing such security challenges might have armed forces three or four times stronger than Georgia and a defense budget 10 times larger.
