Crescita e produttività del settore manifatturiero nei paesi del Sud Europa

In the last fifteen years ICT producing and using sectors have boosted manufacturing productivity both inthe USA and to a lesser extent in the EU. Southern European countries are penalised by a small share of ICT producing sectors. What is more worrying, however, is the slowdown of productivity growth (since 1998 well below the EU15 average) in the sectors that do not use ICT intensively and which constitute the bulk of their industrial structure. Only Greece seems to fare better after a long period of productivity stagnation in the Eighties. In particular, the extent and the pervasiveness of the productivity slowdown in Italy, Spain and Portugal points to common systemic causes that need to be analysed more in depth. Among these the effects of recent labour market reforms deserve special attention. Moreover the productivity slowdown in the three latter countries went hand in hand with a higher relative (to other EU countries) growth of the labour cost per employee, fuelled by higher domestic inflation, lowering substantially the international competitiveness of their industrial production. (JEL: L6, O47, O57)