WEF: Greece Still Needs to Work on Economic Progress

Greece still has a long way to go before it achieves economic progress, ranking last among 29 advanced economies, according to the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Inclusive Development Index (IDI), and urgently in need of speeding up reforms to exit the crisis.

The IDI assesses 103 countries’ economic potential by measuring performance in 11 key areas of economic progress in addition to GDP with focus on growth and development, inclusion, and intergenerational equity -sustainable stewardship of natural and financial resources.

Greece holds the last spot with the first three held by Norway, Iceland and Luxembourg.

Source: World Economic Forum

According to the IDI report, it is vital that Greece prioritize the reform of the education and schooling system in order to reduce the gap between students from different socio-economic backgrounds, cope with the high levels of corruption and bureaucracy that hinder the establishment and development of business ventures, and offer incentives to companies to depart from the “informal economy” in order to create better employment opportunities and broaden the tax base required by state coffers.

The IDI also notes that besides its poor performance among advanced economies, Greece is also below par in key indicators among emerging economies.