those running bigger current-account deficits) and less flexible economic structures. Most of these countries had not sufficiently adapted their institutional frameworks and economic policies to the membership requirements of a monetary union, in which exchange rate devaluation is no longer available to bring about rapid adjustments in competitiveness, and in which the basic parameters of monetary policy have ceased to be set independently by the authorities of each Member State. Having entrusted themselves to the macroeconomic stability provided by monetary union membership and scarcely pressured by markets that remained indifferent, for some time, to the problems being incubated, some of these economies built up significant imbalances, failing to undertake the reforms needed to withstand the shocks that could seriously affect them. The institutional arrangements designed 20 years ago in Maastricht did not have the wherewithal to prevent and, where appropriate, correct this lack of adaptation of national policies to the requirements of a monetary union; and nor did they have the mechanisms to manage the far-reaching and protracted crisis we have experienced. These shortcomings have translated into losses in well-being for the public at large. The impact in terms of output and employment has been enormous. On the projections available, the euro area will not regain the level of GDP existing at the start of 2008 until 2015, at the earliest. And in terms of employment, the gap will take even longer to close. Despite recent positive indicators, the current situation continues to pose challenges of the highest order to both European and national economic authorities.

This has entailed a turnaround in our balance of payment on current account, and will lead in 2013 to a positive contribution of the external sector to GDP of around 2%, the best performance by this variable in recent decades. Competitiveness and export capacity also depend on how productive resources are distributed across sectors and across companies within a single sector. One fundamental challenge the Spanish economy faces is to reallocate the surplus productive resources in non-tradeable sectors to others with higher growth and export potential. At the aggregate level, 8% of the firms existing in 2007 have been destroyed in the 2007–2012 period, while in the construction sector this figure exceeds 30%. In the industrial and services sectors, and having due regard to their high heterogeneity, positive signs are discernible. The sectoral reallocation is only just beginning and still has a long way to run. Economic policy has to contribute to completing this process by removing the obstacles associated with barriers to competition and the red tape hindering business start-ups. Some recent legislative initiatives which pursue these objectives are the law on business support measures, the law to ensure market unity and the future law on professional services and colleges. Market unity and legal certainty are absolutely necessary for sustained growth and job creation, and can and should be objectives shared by government at all levels. Another task is that of completing the adjustment of Spanish corporate and household debt.