Blog
Large and Small
7th February 2009
The economic landscape of the twenty seven member nations of the EU is very different. I find that students preparing for the AQA European economics paper often have little idea of the relative size of economy as measured by GDP. Five countries together account for 72% of EU27 GDP (Germany, the UK, France, Italy and Spain). Ireland - for nearly twenty years the Celtic Tiger but now in real macroeconomic distress - accounts for only 1.5% of EU GDP.
And if we add together the national income of
Romania Czech Republic Hungary Slovakia Luxembourg Slovenia Bulgaria Lithuania Latvia Cyprus Estonia and Malta
We get a ‘combined economy’ which contributes 4.7% of EU national income ..... equivalent to a country the size of the Netherlands!
Geoff Riley
Geoff Riley FRSA has been teaching Economics for over thirty years. He has over twenty years experience as Head of Economics at leading schools. He writes extensively and is a contributor and presenter on CPD conferences in the UK and overseas.