Klaus Wohlrabe
Such results were shown in a survey by the Institute for Economic Research (ifo), the results of which were published on August 12.
As Deutsche Welle notes, the ifo institute considers high energy prices, extensive regulation and suboptimal investment conditions to be the reasons for the decreased competitiveness of German companies.
The authors of the survey indicate that the indicator, which fixes the share of German companies losing competitiveness, remained as high as in April. Meanwhile, the trend in the EU’s internal market is similar: the proportion of German companies recording a loss of competitiveness compared to companies from other EU countries has fallen very little since April, from 13.4% to 12%.
“German industry is struggling with structural weaknesses – such as energy prices, regulation and investment conditions,” commented Klaus Wohlrabe, deputy head of the Center for Macroeconomics and Surveys at the ifo institute, quoted by Deutsche Welle, on the data.
The results of the survey showed that the competitiveness of German companies has not increased recently in any industry. But its decline is especially noticeable in the machine building industry. According to ifo, there the share of companies with falling competitiveness increased from 22.2% to 31.9%. “This is the highest figure recorded so far,” the authors of the study state.
At the same time, the situation in the automotive industry has clearly improved since the last survey: the share of enterprises that reported a further decline in their competitiveness has almost halved: from 33.0% to 16%.
But the US imposed duties of 15% on EU goods may become a new serious challenge for the German industry, according to the authors of the survey. Klaus Wohlrabe stated in this regard that it is still difficult to say whether new trade ties will be able to offset the costs associated with U.S. duties.
