Die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung im Inland: Konjunktur nach Delle mit wenig Schwung
The German economy markedly lost momentum in the second half of 2018. Real GDP almost stagnated mostly owed to special factors influencing the automotive and the chemical industry. However, also the underlying trend slowed down, mainly because of the global economy losing momentum. Nevertheless, employment continued to grow, and investment has been rising until most recently, too. There is some indication that GDP has grown in the first quarter of 2019. The production of passenger cars started to move towards its long-term average after having plunged in the fall of 2018 due to problems introducing the Worldwide harmonized Light vehicles Test Procedure (WLTP). Furthermore, production of chemicals was no longer hampered by low water which had led to a shortage in transportation capacity. In addition, growth is stimulated by fiscal measures that became effective at the beginning of 2019. Summing up, we forecast GDP to grow by 0.9 percent in 2019. For 2020, an increase by 1.5 percent is expected. The higher rate, however, mainly reflects a working day effect. Employment is forecasted to continue growing but will slow down somewhat parallel to the slowing of aggregate output. The unemployment rate will decline further to 4.8 percent in this year and 4.6 percent in 2020. Inflation will be somewhat lower compared to 2018, dampened by the decline of oil prices observed since fall 2018. At the same time, core inflation (inflation excluding energy prices) will increase slightly in the wake of capacity utilization remaining strong. We forecast inflation rates of 1.4 percent in this year and 1.6 per cent in the next. In 2018, fiscal surplus reached 1.7 percent in relation to nominal GDP. In this year and the next, fiscal stance will become more expansionary, particularly in 2019. Furthermore, public revenues will grow less buoyantly due to the economy slowing. Consequently, fiscal surplus will go down to 1.0 percent in relation to GDP in this year and to 0.8 percent in the next.