Falling capital accumulation and labour utilisation have brought potential growth from a level close to 2% in the years preceding the crisis to less than 1% on average between 2008 and 2012.3 A recent study4 of the Centre for European Policy Studies makes for sobering reading, suggesting that the prospective decline in the working age population (averaging 0.6% per annum until 2030) would translate to an annual growth rate of about only 1% to 1.5% until 2030.
If one runs into trouble, it’s a European concern, not only a concern for the country where the bank is based.4 The actual implementation of the project took a different direction. The prerequisite of common supervision was realized first: since 2014 ‘significant’ banks are supervised by a European authority (the Single Supervisory Mechanism, based in Frankfurt).