Despite signs of recovery, the Eurozone crisis is still far from over

The Eurozone emerged from recession in the second quarter of 2013, with the single currency area’s GDP increasing by 0.3 per cent. Bob Hancké writes that although the situation in the Eurozone has improved, a closer look at the economic data would suggest reason for caution. He argues that the root cause of Europe’s sovereign debt crisis may not have been excessive public spending, but rather a divergence between wages in sheltered sectors (largely in the public sector) and the manufacturing (export) sectors in European economies, which affected states’ external competitiveness. Until this problem is solved any recovery is likely to be short lived.