Monetary policy measures have contributed to the increase in activity and in inflation  Economic research shows that these measures have been effective in the recent past, in terms of easing financial conditions and encouraging lending. Bearing this in mind, the new package of measures will boost economic activity in the euro area against a background of high uncertainty and will help to bring about the convergence of inflation to levels in line with the ECB's mandate. As regards negative interest rates, although there is no conclusive evidence to date that they have adversely affected the supply of bank credit, we cannot rule out that maintaining 5/18  rates at very low levels for an additional, potentially extended, period of time, could ultimately have some negative consequences for the bank-based transmission of monetary policy. In this regard, the mitigating measures adopted by the ECB, consisting of a tiered system for remunerating excess liquidity holdings, are intended to soften the negative impact on bank profitability of the new reduction in reserve remuneration, and thus ensure the expansionary effect on activity and inflation of the interest rate cuts in the current setting. Prolongation of the current expansionary cycle, albeit at a more moderate rate than in previous years  In relation to the Spanish economy, the latest economic data point to a gradual weakening of activity. First, the indicators that measure agents’ confidence have tended to gradually deteriorate since the beginning of 2018, albeit less so than in the euro area as a whole.
13 I. Dierickx and K. Cool (1989), “Asset Stock Accumulation and Sustainability of Competitive Advantage”, Management Science, vol. 35, pp. 1504-1511. 15/18  restructuring of government organisations engaging in innovation so as to exploit synergies between them. The government research assessment systems could also be redesigned to ensure that the allocation of funds to research centres reflects their academic excellence14 and a public-private collaboration framework could be developed in which the private sector can efficiently channel government funds through the design of well-defined incentives. The demographic challenge: population ageing The challenges associated with slow productivity growth and with the transformations resulting from the technological progress I have just described above take on even greater importance when they are framed in the context of the transition to a new demographic paradigm characterised by population ageing which, although present in many Western economies, has a particularly strong impact on Spain. The ageing challenge  Indeed, the combination of a low birth rate, high longevity and the impending retirement of the generation known as the baby boomers makes Spain one of the countries where the dependency ratio, which measures the proportion of persons at least 65 years of age to those aged from 16 to 64, is increasing most sharply. Specifically, according to the latest projections by the Spanish National Statistics Institute, the dependency ratio will grow from 29.9% in 2019 to 51.8% in 2050, i.e. it will practically double in three decades.