While the German economy is stagnating, Poland's is growing at a remarkable pace: the forecast for 2025 is for economic growth of 3.6 percent. What does Germany's neighbor do better than it?
For the first time in European history, Poland is a stable and prosperous country that plays a key role in geopolitical terms, writes the Swiss “Neue Zürcher Zeitung“ (NCZ) in its publication. According to the publication, this is an exceptional event in the history of European geoeconomics, and its uniqueness stands out even more when looking back at history.
Just a little over 100 years ago, the country did not exist at all, the NCZ recalls. At the end of the 18th century, the three great powers of Austria, Prussia and Russia divided up the territory of the Royal Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. And when, after World War I, the Poles finally got their own nation-state, it was a fragmented land without a common infrastructure and institutions.
The inherited railway lines are of different widths, there is no common currency, nor a unified tax system. The starting conditions could not have been more difficult, the Swiss publication points out. Despite hyperinflation, military coup and depression, however, the country grew until in 1939 it found itself again in the crosshairs of Germany and Russia - it was divided again and experienced a catastrophe. During World War II, Poland lost six million of its inhabitants (17 percent of the population), including three million Jews.
ADVERTISEMENT
In terms of purchasing power, it rivals Japan and Spain
After 1945, the Poles got their country back, but it was shifted several hundred kilometers to the west: Stalin annexed Eastern Poland, but Poland received German areas in return. Over a million Poles were forcibly resettled, Germans were expelled from the new Polish areas. At the same time, the newly formed country had to establish itself as a Soviet satellite, although relations with the headquarters in Moscow and with the neighboring GDR were bad.
It is no coincidence that the decline of the Eastern Bloc began with the founding of the independent trade union "Solidarity" in Gdansk. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, the freely elected Polish government decided to implement shock economic and political therapy. In a short time, it privatized a large part of state property, reduced inflation, stabilized the currency, cleaned up state finances and opened the country to foreign investment. What completely failed in Russia, works in Poland.
Many of the Ukrainian refugees in Poland workPhoto: Beata Zawrzel/Anadolu Agency/picture alliance
After a short recession, the country is growing year after year. According to calculations by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), today the purchasing power per capita in Poland is similar to that in Japan and Spain and will soon reach the levels in Italy and the UK, writes NCC.
Poland naturally has its problems, the Swiss publication continues, citing, for example, the dramatic drop in the birth rate to 1.16 children per woman. However, no one can bypass Warsaw anymore, the Swiss publication summarizes.
A good place for foreign investment
The German magazine “Focus“ writes that the European Commission expects 3.6 percent economic growth in Poland this year. It quotes economic consultant Renata Kabas-Komorniczak, according to whom the already high interest of foreign investors in Poland is only going to increase - especially because of the stable economic framework conditions. The expert points out that no other economy in Central and Eastern Europe is growing as fast as Poland. The same applies to foreign direct investment, with Poland ahead of countries such as the Czech Republic, Hungary, Bulgaria or Romania.
Kabasz-Komorniczak points out as factors for Poland's attractiveness as a place to invest the high share of working women (52 percent), as well as the large number of Ukrainian refugees who have arrived in Poland and are participating in the labor market. And it's not just them - migrants from Belarus and other post-Soviet countries such as Uzbekistan, Tajikistan or Georgia also work in the country, most of whom are also well integrated.
Poland has not only a workforce, but also highly qualified people with exceptional language skills. “Learning English starts in kindergarten, and many Poles also speak German well.“ At the same time, labor costs remain lower: the average salary in Poland is around 1,860 euros, programmers earn between 3,000 and 5,000 euros.