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Interview: Spain's economic improvements unevenly distributed,says scholar

Xinhua, December 15, 2016 Adjust font size:

The improvement experienced by the Spanish economy were unevenly distributed geographically and among people, said Antonio Argandona, emeritus professor of economics and business ethics at the IESE Business School in Barcelona.

In a recent interview with Xinhua, Argandona said that despite 2016 being a "good year for the Spanish economy," there was an "uneven" situation.

"The figures are positive but the impact of these figures among the population is not homogeneous," said Argandona.

"There are areas of the country, such as Andalusia, Extremadura, or the Canary Islands where growth is still low and the unemployment rate very high", he said, explaining that unemployed people or those with transitory or precarious jobs" do not fully participate in that economic recovery."

According to the last Inquest into the Active Population (EPA), in the third quarter of the year, there were a total of 4.3 million unemployed people in Spain, while the temporary rate (the proportion of temporary contracts over the total number of contracts in the country) was at its highest since the end of 2008.

"The Spanish economy, from the point of view of the labor market, has three problems: first, the high unemployment rate, second, the large increase in temporarity and very short-term contracts and third, low wage growth and low wages", Argandona said.

The professor is in favor of implementing more reforms within the labor market, since he considers that Spain has had "a rigid labor market, which was difficult to adapt to the circumstances."

In his opinion, this caused a duality: separation between workers with indefinite contract and protected and workers with temporary and unprotected contracts.

Argandona predicted a 2017 "positive for the economy" and pointed out several unknowns facts such as oil prices, the new government in the United States and the political scenario in other European countries.

For Argandona, the growth experienced during 2016 has been high, and highlighted the creation of employment, growth in consumption and investment in equipment, as positive factors.

He warned that Spain still faced "a loss of economic growth strength, insufficient job creation and a high level of bad loans in the banking system."

"We have a good 2017, but worse than 2016 and we will have a good 2018, but worse than 2017," he said. Endit