Why Poland

Poland has aimed a policy of economic liberalization since 1990 and today stands out as a success story among transition economies. It is the only country in the European Union that avoided a recession and crisis through the 2008-09 economic downturn. Since 2004, EU membership and access to EU structural funds have provided a major stimulation to the economy. Inflation reached a low of about 2.6% in 2010 due to the global economic slowdown, but climbed to 4.3% in 2011. Weak revenues, together with rising demands to fund healthcare, education, and the state pension system caused the public sector budget deficit to rise to 7.8% of GDP in 2010, but the PO/PSL coalition government, which came to power in November 2007, took measures to shore up public finances - including increasing contributions to the public pension scheme at the expense of private pension funds - and reduced the deficit to 2.9% of GDP in 2011. Encouraging to hear that for the future years the coalition government has proposed further deficit-reducing reforms and to fulfill its promise to enact business-friendly reforms.

European Commission Council of Europe European Migration Network Migration Policy Institute International Organization for Migration