smoothly and successfully as the changeover to the euro on 1 january 1999. 3. comments on other activities of the eurosystem as far as the other activities of the eurosystem are concerned, during 2000, the eurosystem continued to devote great attention to the issue of how to improve cross - border retail payment services within the euro area. in pursuit of its policy to act as a catalyst for change, the eurosystem has continued to organise meetings with the european banking sector and payment system industry in order to monitor the progress achieved with regard to the seven objectives defined by the eurosystem. in september last year, the eurosystem published a progress report, which concluded that progress has been achieved in some areas, such as the agreement on standards allowing straight - through processing, the lightening and harmonisation of the balance - of - payments reporting requirements and the establishment of a cross - border low - value payment system by the european banking association. however, in several other areas further progress is needed, in particular with a view to further reducing the level of fees charged to retail customers. therefore, the eurosystem will continue to closely monitor the progress with regard to the fulfilment of its stated objectives in this field. to this end, a new progress report is intended for publication in early 2002. to conclude my opening remarks, let me turn to the annual accounts of the ecb for last year. the ecb made a net profit amounting to eur 1, 990 million, after setting aside an agreed provision of eur 2, 600 million against its large exchange rate exposure. this profit is also net of remuneration amounting to eur 1, 375 million of the claims by the national central banks of the eurosystem on the ecb with respect to the foreign reserve assets that had been transferred to the ecb at the beginning of 1999. in the course of last year, the ecb further increased its number of staff by 209, and it currently employs around 1, 000 staff members from all 15 eu member states. the ecb's budget for 2001 foresees an increase in the number of staff by around 7 % compared with last year. overall, the ecb looks back over the first years of the single monetary policy with satisfaction. developments since the start of monetary union have confirmed that the ecb has chosen a solid and efficient framework for monetary policy. the ecb's monetary policy strategy has offered a robust guide for

, via hysteresis, structural unemployment. but it also reflects weak underlying trends in productivity growth and labour supply. consequently, while some of the bartelsman, e., f. di mauro and e. dorrucci ( 2015 ), “ eurozone rebalancing : are we on the right track for growth? insights from the compnet micro - based data. ” www. voxeu. org. draghi, m. “ stability and prosperity in monetary union. ” speech at the university of helsinki, 27 november 2014. see also keynote address at the suddeutsche zeitung fuhrungstreffen wirtschaft, november 2013. banco de espana ( 2013 ), “ variation in the cyclical sensitivity of spanish inflation : an initial approximation. ” economic bulletin, july – august 2013. riggi, m., and f. venditti ( 2014 ), “ surprise! euro area inflation has fallen. ” banca d ’ italia occasional papers no. 237, september 2014. european commission, winter 2015 projections ; imf, april 2015 weo ; oecd, november 2014 economic outlook. bis central bankers ’ speeches effects of the crisis on investment and employment are expected to unwind, potential growth is projected to remain well below pre - crisis growth rates. this is problematic for at least three reasons. first, it would mean that the output gap would close at a notably lower level of output, at which point monetary policy would have to return to a more neutral stance ( chart 4 ). a significant share of the economic losses suffered across countries would therefore become permanent. structural unemployment would stay around 10 %. youth unemployment would also remain elevated, with devastating effects for individuals in terms of labour market “ scarring ”. 8 and this would ultimately affect society as a whole as, given our demographics, realising the potential of the young and their capacity for innovation is essential for long - term sustainability. second, a situation of persistently low potential growth would make it even harder to work through the debt overhang that still exists in parts of the euro area. for firms that took on debt based on pre - crisis growth expectations, low potential growth acts as a major barrier to new investment, as any profits generated will likely be absorbed by servicing existing debt. and we do see signs that this effect has been operative in euro area : there is a clear negative correlation between corporate debt - to - gdp levels in different countries at the beginning of