The corona virus has triggered a global economic crisis. Gabriel Felbermayr from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy analyzed the situation.
In any case, Austria will be badly affected economically, since exports account for a large part of the gross domestic product. “Austria is particularly badly affected among other countries of similar size,” said Felbermayr in the “Special ZiB” on ORF on Friday evening. One must also worry about the effects of Italy’s dramatic corona situation on Austria.
“A fully grown crisis”
Especially in Tyrol, the raging virus in Italy could pose not only economic but also tourist problems. As Felbermayr points out: It is “a full-blown crisis” and it affects, without fault, a country that has in fact had no economic growth in recent years. This is “a problem that we have to take care of in Europe, otherwise the Austrian economy will suffer,” said Felbermayr.
The fact that the virus hit Italy was “simply unlucky for Italy” and “luck” for Austria, according to the economic researcher – while the cases in Italy rose rapidly, Austria was able to prepare for the situation. Now Italy must be “helped in an act of solidarity”, including through direct payments to deal with the crisis. And also to keep Europe together. After the Brexit, a loss of other countries would be a disaster, said Felbermayr. He does not want to rule out that stimulus programs will be needed. “We still cannot say how big the fear factor of people is when shopping.”
