75% of managers (surveyed in a CONFIDEX survey on confidence in the economy, conducted by Impetum Group) believe that a labor crisis is more likely than a rise in inflation. As a result, more and more business owners are counting on an increase in public and private investment.
“The labor crisis comes from two areas: we have an acute shortage of skilled labor and we have jobs that Romanians don’t want and there is no one to do them. The two crises overlap, as they did many years ago in the West, and they are putting pressure on Romanian managers. A first need of the Romanian business environment is real support from the authorities to manage this labour crisis. We can do this both through internal resources, by increasing the percentage of the population that is active in the labour force, to reach the European average (69% Romania compared to 75% EU), and by relaxing immigration procedures for professions that are not attractive to Romanians (from 100,000 work permits annually to at least 300,000)”, said Andrei Cionca, CEO Impetum Group.
In the period to follow, twice as many managers expect an increase in public investment (41% compared to 24% of managers in 2022) as well as private investment (28% compared to 12% of managers in 2022). At the same time, only 21% of managers (compared to 43% in 2022) still believe that GDP will decrease.
Confidence in the capital market is also increasing. Three times more Romanian managers believe that the stock market will grow. According to the survey, managers’ optimism is based on the resilience and maturity developed in recent years – following the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. For the first time, CONFIDEX highlights the orientation of Romanian managers towards export and foreign markets.
It’s gonna be a long strike for Romanian teachers (and students)
