F29 - International Factor Movements: OtherReturn

Each year we are informed in the "World Competitiveness Yearbook" , which is published by the International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, about the bad and/or deteriorating competitiveness of Centraleuropean transition countries, although their export performance, as well as their market shares, are increasing permanently at an above-average pace. We ascertained, that the contradiction between this evaluation and reality is caused mainly by the fact, that among the huge number of criteria, on which the conclusions of this Institute are based, are missing most of the classical, theoretically founded, criteria of competitiveness. This contradiction is also due to the fact, that conditions established in the economically most developed countries of the world, are regarded by this Institute as the main "etalon" for its evaluations, so that any deviation from these "norms", even those which are caused merely by the fact, that new EU member-states are still transition countries, are interpreted as a proof of their weak competitiveness. This biased vision of the competitiveness of these countries has numerous negative consequences, beginning with the worsening of conditions under which they can achieve access to foreign financial resources, upto the weakening of the confidence of foreign investors in their competitiveness and technological capabilities, (which negatively influences the choice of productions these investors are willing to establish here). Thus it is of utmost importance to make the economic public aware of the good competitiveness of the Czech republic and of other new EU member-states from among Centraleuropean transition countries, which is revealed among others also by convincing data, presented in the above mentioned article.