Competitiveness is therefore related to macroeconomic stability and the ability to maintain the real value of people’s assets, as well as to structural factors that contribute to the long-term growth potential. 1 The introduction of the euro has been recognised as a remarkable success not only in Europe, but across the entire world.
Since then, Monetary Union has been effective and very successful in providing the right framework for Europe to be performing and to create jobs. However, given the modest growth performance of the European countries and of the euro area in the past, improving structural factors to raise European competitiveness remains a major policy issue.