Structural changes and future perspectives of CEE economies

The paper explores the structural changes that have taken place in Central and Eastern countries during the crisis, and elaborates on the effects that such changes bring about in the possible future growth trajectories for these countries. In particular, trends in the important sources of productivity gains of these countries are analysed. The paper presents some future perspectives based on assumptions on the basis of alternative evolutions of such structural changes. Perspectives will be presented in forms of scenarios, i.e. quantitative foresights on the way in which European Countries will evolve in terms of GDP and employment, under two alternative, and rather radical, assumptions. In particular, thanks to MASST3, a macroeconomic regional growth model which achieved its third version, two opposite scenarios are presented; a competitiveness scenario, built on the assumptions that CEE countries re-gain their competitive assets, and a cohesive scenario, where policies are oriented to the support of weak areas within these countries. The time span will be up to 2030.