us growth. the french election gave a fresh political impetus to stability and reforms ; public support for europe has significantly increased : up 18 percentage points in france from last year ( 56 % in spring 2017 ) according to a recent survey by the pew research center ; and the same trend can be observed in a number of countries. most importantly, we in the eu - 27 should not devote all our energy to brexit, at the expense of investing in our own future. in this regard, it is the right time to move up a gear. to boost european growth, financial levers are of the essence, but economic levers play a role too. this is the reason why i often speak of europe ’ s “ growth triangle ”. in my view, europe needs to activate three levers : the financing union for investment and innovation that i have just described, but also implement national structural reforms on the one hand and a better euro area policy mix on the other. national structural reforms are a prerequisite for each country to unleash our collective growth page 5 sur 5 potential. in addition, they would amplify the effects of the financing union : such a union would foster firms ’ ability to invest and national reforms would foster firms ’ willingness to invest. the third lever is a euro area policy - mix based on a better coordination of macroeconomic policies. this requires a collective economic strategy whereby member states seal a deal : if we combine more structural reforms where they are needed – in france and italy for instance –, and more fiscal or wage support in countries with room for manoeuvre – for example, germany and the netherlands – growth and employment will undoubtedly be stronger everywhere in europe. if we seize this opportunity, europe ’ s time will come. thank you for your attention.

there are cases where lasting real growth differentials do not reflect welcome catching - up processes, but rather structural deficiencies in some countries, leading to low trend output growth and persistently high unemployment rates. such divergences between different countries are independent of whether or not these countries share the same currency, and in any case cannot be addressed by monetary policy. countries that show a relatively poor performance in terms of longer - term trends of real growth and job creation are often also those whose domestic economy has been less flexible. for these countries structural reforms are highly advisable. measures aimed at strengthening product market competition, labour market flexibility and thus job creation would certainly be welcome. they would enhance the incentives for firms to both invest in real and human capital and offer new jobs. close monitoring of unit labour cost and wage moderation are also, in such cases, essential to reduce excessively high unemployment. the more successful the structural measures are, the more jobs will be created at current wage levels and the less wage moderation will thus be needed in the long run. however, for those sectors and areas of qualification in which unemployment is high and / or the competitiveness of domestic workers is threatened, wage moderation, will be important to support job creation, and thus consumption demand. let me stress that both types of measure - reforms and wage moderation - support employment even in a rather closed economy. of course, both measures would tend also to enhance external competitiveness, but their positive effects do not depend on this latter channel. sometimes a radically different equilibrating mechanism is suggested. it has been argued that a euro area country that experiences relatively weak aggregate demand should increase wages more strongly in order to ensure higher demand for domestic goods. this would, however, be counterproductive. higher real wage and unit labour costs in areas where unemployment is too high would undermine job creation and thus reduce demand and supply even further. of course, once full employment has been reached, real wages can and should grow in line with productivity increases. all countries and economies benefit substantially from emu as i am speaking here in mannheim, let me emphasise that the economies that had a very credible currency before the euro such as germany are benefiting substantially from their integration into the euro area. the euro is as credible and stable as the deutsche mark before it. the purchasing power of german workers and consumers has been enhanced by relatively cheap imports from countries within europe and beyond. employment has been supported by strong export growth, not