An Analysis of Economic Changes in Countries of Central and Eastern Europe Belonging to the European Union in the Years 2003-2014

Abstract

Economic changes in the Eastern Bloc countries which currently belong to the European Union can be characterized as incredibly strong and important. In the process of catching up with the general development some problems have been reduced (i.e., these countries have reduced unemployment, inflation and the cost of raised capital, increased the level of foreign exchange reserves and relative productivity as measured by the size of GDP per capita), other issues started to increase – most of these economies have a high and/or increasing public and external debt, which increases investment risk and reduces the potential for development; it is also inhibited by the relatively high level of public revenue and expenditure. In many of them economic growth is too low and unstable, in order to reduce noticeably in the near future the gap in the level of income per capita to the Western economies, or to mitigate the burden and cost of financing economic development with debt; decreasing differences in price levels reduces the competitiveness of those countries). The main aim of the present paper is to show the changes of the period 2003-2014 in major economic areas of these countries and also to point out the potential sources of economic issues in the future. For this purpose the method of inductive reasoning based on comparative analysis of selected economic indicators was used