By T. Tsiros
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A modest increase in GDP growth in the first quarter of 2019 is apparently dampening hopes by the government for an annual hike for the year exceeding 2 percent.
A drop in unemployment and welfare bonuses doled out by the poll-trailing Tsipras government failed to significantly impact consumer spending in the first quarter of the year, with the growth rate moving at 1.3 percent on an annualized basis in Q1 2019.
The forecast for the entire year is 2.3 percent, which means that the three subsequent quarters must both exceed and make up for the slack in Q1.
With an election season now in full swing in the second quarter, whereas the economic situation in Europe is directly linked to two sectors that are imperative to Greece’s economic recovery, namely, tourism and exports.
The growth rate for the first quarter of 2018 reached 2.6 percent, on an annual basis, with the overall yearly rate for the year ending at a respectable 2.6 percent, given the country’s emergence from nearly a decade of economic implosion.
