, compared to their European counterparts, is again evident during the pandemic, particularly in terms of how quickly their citizens became impoverished. This is revealed by the 10% decline suffered by Spanish GDP per capita between 2019 and 2020, according to the most recent data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), going from 42,600 to 38,442 constant dollars, without taking into account the depreciating effect of the inflation. This percentage is exactly double the decrease suffered by the average of the European Union of 27 countries in the same period, when it fell from 46,728 dollars in 2019 to 44,427 last year (39,100 euros).
A more detailed comparison of Spain with the other heavyweights of the Monetary Union is not favorable either. Undoubtedly, GDP per capita suffered significantly from the damage caused by the Great Confinement in both France and Italy, with year-on-year falls of 7% and 7.5% respectively, but neither of them equals the intensity of the decline in our country .
Much further behind is Germany, whose more than notable resistance of the productive fabric limited the deterioration to 3.5%, even lower than the community average.
Undoubtedly, the Covid-19 crisis represents a sui generis convulsion, difficult to compare with other economic turbulences of the recent past, to the extent that it had . However, even in the face of a unique phenomenon such as the coronavirus pandemic, the usual weaknesses and inertia returned to the surface of the Spanish economy.
Precisely monitoring the recent evolution of per capita income reveals to what extent this variable suffered especially from the ravages of the crisis that took place between 2008 and 2013 and, in fact, it can be affirmed that it has not been the same since then in our country. To verify this, it is necessary to resort to a more precise measurement method over long periods of time, such as purchasing power parity (PPP) as specifically calculated by Eurostat.
In this case, the so-called European INE takes as a reference the per capita income level of the EU as a whole with 27 members and gives it a constant value of 100 points throughout the years considered.
a long decline
In 2011, the year corresponding to the zenith of the last crisis, the Spanish were very close to matching the community average in terms of purchasing power, standing at 93 points; What’s more, said record was remarkably close to the 105 that Italy showed in the same period of time.
The Spanish did not recover that level of purchasing power (93 points) again until 2017 and it was for a very short time, given that in 2018 that level had dropped two points.
Regarding its current situation, the latest data from Eurostat show that the indicator lost the barrier of 90 units in 2020 and the gap with respect to the Community average has returned to levels typical of the first decade of this century, in the first years of life of the euro. At this point, it is worth asking what weakness Spain presents that is not repeated in its European counterparts.
Experts from the Bruegel think tank in Brussels say that there may be multiple influencing factors but, in the Spanish case, they point to the . It is significant that this last variable decreases in our country even at a time of GDP growth, as shown by the National Accounts data for recent quarters.
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