- You are here:
- Home
- › Travel & living abroad
- › Travel advice by country
- › Country profiles
- › Europe
- › Austria
Europe
Austria |
|
|
Last reviewed: 12 December 2008 |
Country information
ECONOMY
Basic Economic Facts
GDP: €282,2 bn (2008)
GDP per capita: €31,300 (2007)
GDP growth: 2% (2008)
Inflation: 3.4% (2008)
Major Industries: food, luxury commodities, mechanical engineering, steel construction, chemicals, vehicle manufacturing and service industries.
Major trading partners: Over 70% of Austrian exports are destined for the EU (2008). Germany and Italy are Austria’s traditional and most important trading partners, but there are also significant trading links to Scandinavia, Britain and Ireland. With the EU’s eastward expansion, Austria has also established important trading links to the new EU Member States, in particular Hungary and the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovenia. Vienna, due to its favourable geographical location and strong historical ties, has become an important hub for multinationals operating in the region.
Unemployment was, in 2008, amongthe lowest in the EU at 3.2%. While still comparatively low, this is climbing, andis predicted to rise to 4.2% in 2009 and 4.8% in 2010, with job losses inindustry, especially automotive. Somemajor employers have started putting workers on reduced hours. Unemploymentwas 5.2% in September 2006 and 4.4% in 2007. Youth unemployment was at 6.3% inAugust 2008 (EU average 14.9%), the second lowest in the EU. The Finance Minister’s stated budgetpriority for 2009/2010 is to tackle unemployment to avoid the economic crisisturning into a social crisis.
Austrian inflationreached a 15-year record high of 3.9% in June 2008, although the average annualfigure for 2008 was 3.4% . The annual rate was 1.7% in 2006 and 2.2% in 2007.Inflation is forecast to drop to 0.5% in 2009.
Austria ’sbudget deficit was 0.4% of GDP in2008, reflecting a higher tax intake during several boom years. The figure for 2007 was 0.7% and 2006 1.4% Projectionsfurther ahead vary widely: the government plan is for 2.2% and 2.9% in 2009/10,with OECD estimates as high as 3.5%. The government’s latest (April 09) Maastricht budget deficit forecast is 3.5% for 2009 and 4.7% for 2010-12 with a slightimprovement to 3.9% for 2013. As a result, publicsector debt is expected to rise steadily from 61% of GDP in 2008, to 62.5%in 2009 and then up to 78.5% by 2013(€247.3bn).
In the past fewyears, exports had been invariably the driving force of economic growth, withexports up from 37.9% of GDP in 1996 to 58.2% of GDP in 2007. In comparisonwith 2007, the turnover of Austrian foreign trade for 2008 indicated positiveimport as well as export growth rates. Imports increased by 4.3% to €119.13bn,exports rose by 2.3% to €117.33bn. Germany remains Austria’smost important trading partner (imports 40.5% / exports 29.7%), followed by Italy and the US as most important non-EU tradingpartner. In2008, the Eastern European countries accounted for most of the increase inexports (€2.65bn). In 2008, services exports to the 15 “old” EU Member Statesstagnated, while exports to the 12 “new Member States had jumped by 12%.Exports to Russia stood outwith an increase by as much as 50%, pushing Russia into the top ten of Austrianexport destination. However, Austrian exports have notremained untouched by the global economic crisis and are expected to be hithard by Germany’seconomic woes.
Tourism plays animportant role in the Austrian economy, contributing 16.1% to GDP in 2008 (totaltourism & leisure industry). The full effect of the economic downturn hasnot yet been felt by Austria’stourism industry, inn 2008 overnight stays had still gone up with more than 126million overnight stays (compared to 121 million in 2007). . Germany continuesto be the most important market for Austrian tourism. In 2008, the number ofGerman tourists increased by 4% to 50.08 million overnight stays after thenumber had gone down the previous summer seasons. The overall number oftourists from the new EU Members States (mainly from the Czech Republic andPoland; up 27.8% and 33.9%) continued to go up in 2008 as well as the number inovernight stays from Russian tourists (plus 40.3%).
