Economy

13-09-2024

European ‘naivety’ could trigger industrial collapse, warns new Econ Committee Chair

Est. 5min

Europe should stop being "naive" and step up efforts to support its faltering industrial base to compete with China and the United States, the newly elected chairman of the European Parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee told Euractiv in an interview.

04-09-2024

Green jobs set to find home away from Europe, head of largest industrial union warns

Est. 5min

While the EU Green Deal came with the promise of new jobs in green industries offsetting job losses elsewhere, these jobs are currently being created outside Europe, warned Judith Kirton-Darling, General Secretary of trade union IndustriAll Europe.

08-08-2024

Econ vice chair Boeselager: Plans for European champions akin to ‘government capture’

Est. 5min

Damian Boeselager (Greens/EFA), co-founder of the pan-European Volt party, warned that EU officials' focus on encouraging European firms to "scale up" risks pushing the bloc's competition policy "in a completely wrong direction".

30-07-2024

Social welfare will be key to Europe’s competitiveness, says Parliament’s new employment committee chief

Est. 5min

The Left Group prioritised securing the chairmanship of the European Parliament’s labour affairs committee to prevent any rollback of environmental and workers’ protections over the next five-year mandate, the new committee’s leftist chief told Euractiv in an interview.

04-06-2024

Europe Ahead: Socialists’ Schmit on why over-regulation isn’t Europe’s main problem

Est. 5min

Europe’s economic problems primarily result from insufficient investment rather than excessively burdensome regulations, the Socialists’ lead candidate for the Commission presidency, Nicolas Schmit, told Euractiv in an interview.

31-05-2024

High prices, high rates will be new normal in post-COVID world, BNP economists warn

Est. 4min

Europe is facing a “generational shift” in its economic architecture that will cause inflation to be structurally higher than at any period since the early 1980s, two leading BNP Paribas economists told Euractiv, warning that high price pressures and high interest rates will be the new normal.

28-05-2024

Europe Ahead: Greens/EFA’s Andresen on the false climate vs economy dilemma

Est. 5min

Right-wing arguments that Europe would need to sacrifice its climate ambitions in order to boost its competitiveness are groundless and increasingly rejected by business leaders, the head of the German members of the Greens/EFA group at the European Parliament told Euractiv.

21-05-2024

Europe Ahead: EPP’s Poptcheva on taking the edge off private investment

Est. 6min

In an interview with Euractiv, Eva Poptcheva also stressed that public investments should aim to “take the edge” of private investments that might otherwise be too risky to undertake.

14-05-2024

Europe Ahead: ECR’s Hoogeveen on why EU needs ‘deregulation’

Est. 5min

Europe should deregulate its economy and “develop a culture of private investment” similar to the US, the vice chair of the European Parliament's Committee of Economic and Monetary Affairs told Euractiv in an interview.

08-05-2024

Collapse of EU-China political ties more dangerous than trade decoupling, top think tank chief warns

Est. 5min

The main danger facing EU-China relations is the deterioration of political ties that would hamper the global effort to combat climate change, the head of a leading European think-tank told Euractiv in an interview on Tuesday (7 May).

07-05-2024

Europe Ahead: Left’s Gusmão on following US, China path

Est. 5min

The EU must overcome its “ideological prejudice” against government spending and adopt state-led industrial policies similar to those in the US and China to boost its faltering economy, according to the vice-chair of the European Parliament's Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs José Gusmão.

15-04-2024

Bulgarian commissioner: To adequately finance R&D, the EU needs private capital

Est. 6min

Iliana Ivanova, European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth shared with Euractiv in an interview her views on how to fill the gap in financing of science and innovation in the member states which stands at €100 billion per year.

10-04-2024

€600m Italy recovery fund fraud likely to be repeated, EU audit chief warns

Est. 5min

The head of the EU’s auditing body warned that there is “absolutely” a risk that recent news of the alleged embezzlement of hundreds of millions of euros from the bloc’s pandemic recovery fund could reoccur in future.

26-01-2024

EIB ready to work more with defence but remains cautious, vice-president says

Est. 5min

The European Investment Bank is open to financing defence industries but is still reluctant to go beyond dual-use technology, a top EIB official told Euractiv, warning also that the idea of using eurobonds to finance military industry must be carefully weighed as they may not attract investors.

22-12-2023

Expert on EU-Mercosur deal: Argentina needs green investments, not rules

Est. 4min

Marcela Cristini, senior economist at the Argentinian Foundation for Economic Investigations in Latin America (FIEL), argued that the new Argentinian government would favour the trade deal between the EU and Mercosur but that the EU's ecological requirements went too far. As …

21-12-2023

Macron may be ‘killer of Social Europe’, Platform Work Directive rapporteur warns

Est. 5min

Member states must do everything to ensure the Platform Work Directive provisional deal is approved, Parliament file rapporteur Elisabetta Gualmini told Euractiv in an interview, warning that France’s refusal to vote on the text is “unacceptable”.

20-12-2023

German Socialist politician warns against failed EU debt rule talks

Est. 5min

Much is at stake in the reform of EU debt rules, which could also threaten the very existence of the euro, Social Democrat MEP Joachim Schuster told Euractiv in an interview.

02-12-2023

Nobel economist: Rapid technological changes drive EU skills shortages

Est. 5min

Skills shortages across the EU can be explained by technological changes so rapid that workers and companies alike are struggling to keep up, labour economics scholar and Nobel prize winner Christopher Pissarides told Euractiv in an interview on Friday (1 December).

30-11-2023

EU budget deal held up by Berlin’s internal debate, bloc’s finance chief says 

Est. 5min

Germany's internal fiscal discussion is currently the biggest obstacle to a deal on a mid-term revision of the EU's seven-year financing plan, the EU's Budget Commissioner Johannes Hahn said in an interview on Thursday (30 November).

16-11-2023

Debt rules will affect the most vulnerable, EU trade union chief warns

Est. 5min

The new EU rules for national debts and deficits will limit member states' ability to act on climate change in a socially fair manner, the secretary general of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), Esther Lynch, told Euractiv in an interview, warning against a return of austerity across the bloc.

20-09-2023

Vestager pitches EIB candidacy to Le Maire during Paris visit

Est. 6min

Margrethe Vestager, a top candidate to lead the European Investment Bank (EIB), came to Paris on Wednesday (20 September) to speak at a flagship start-up conference – and pitch her candidacy for the EIB job with Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire.

18-07-2023

Germany wants to persuade France over merits of EU-Mercosur deal

Est. 5min

The German government wants to convince a hesitant France that the merits of the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement - currently being discussed at the EU-CELAC summit - are worthwhile, Franziska Brantner, the parliamentary state secretary in charge of trade at the Economy Ministry, told EURACTIV in an interview.

04-07-2023

France must do more to cut down debt, Court of Auditors chief urges

Est. 5min

France’s debt reduction plan must be more ambitious than what’s already been laid out, French Court of Auditors President and former European Commissioner Pierre Moscovici told EURACTIV France in an interview, warning that the country’s public finances were in a particularly poor state.

14-06-2023

Green transition: Member states must ‘free themselves’ from financial markets, expert says

Est. 5min

Member states must look to financing options other than public debt and taxation to support the green transition and free themselves from debt repayments, French financial economist Jézabel Couppey-Soubeyran told EURACTIV France in an interview.