Euro disaster: Basket-case Italy faces decade of austerity just to get back to 2007 levels
ITALY’S economy is around halfway through a lost two decades, following a slow and painful recovery from the financial crisis that still has a long way to go, according to alarming analysis by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
By LANA CLEMENTS
Express.co.uk
Wed, Jul 13, 2016
Amid a surge in refugees, market turmoil and a slowdown in global trade, the Mediterranean country will not to return to 2007 output levels before the mid-2020s, the fund has forecast.
And the path back to pre-crisis levels is still subject to many risks, warned the IMF.
Italy’s banks and their “strained” balance sheets, which are swapped by very high levels of bad loans, were highlighted as a major area of vulnerability for the economy by the washington-based organisation.
Productivity and investment growth are low, while the unemployment rate is still above 11 per cent – and even higher in some parts of the country and among younger people, added the IMF in its debrief.
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