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Archived Articles  Simeon Mitropolitski is a Canadian analyst, of Bulgarian descent, and former syndicated columnist with the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA). He is the author of several hundred articles dealing with the hot political and economic topics, both Bulgarian and international. ("A Royal Solution." World Press Review. June 1997, provides English versions). He was part of the first group of Bulgarian intellectuals that began the opposition movement that finally put an end to the communist regime in the country, and in 1996-1997 participated in the international monitors' teams during the elections in several Balkan countries - Romania, Albania and Bulgaria. In 1999 he was among the few Bulgarian journalists that supported NATO military operation against Yugoslavia. In 2002 Simeon and his family emigrated from Bulgaria to Canada where they now live in Montreal, Quebec.
Global Real Estate Project
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Italian progress within the Euro-straitjacketItaly has become a quite different country from what we were accustomed to see during most of its post-WWII period. It was famous for its unstable governments, now it's going to fulfill its dream of having one government staying in power for one full 5-year mandate. It was well known for its weak currency, now it has joined one of the most stables in the world, the Euro. Its real estate market was performing badly for many generations outside the largest cities, now it shows double-digit annual growths. And despite all these uncontestable signs of progress the Italians aren't happy. They are less secure about their jobs, about their retirement pensions, about their consumer baskets and generally about their future. If their nemesis has a name, the Euro will grab the prize of the single factor contributing to the public malaise. Among all Eurozone countries the Italians are those who think in least positive terms about their country being part of the whole project. They are also most inclined to accept returning to their national currency the Lira that existed before 1999. To begin with the politics, Italy has at last found what the other parliament democracies call normality, i.e. a government that succeeded in bridging one entire mandate without losing power. If only for this thing we have to give credit to the PM Silvio Berlusconi. His center-right coalition may lose the election in April to the center-left led by the former EU Commission's President Romano Prodi. Looking at the differences in their platform we may assume at first glance that any political change may lead to deep economic and social changes but this is far from the truth. In fact the only thing the Eurozone governments are really able to change is to increase or cut some taxes. Brussels strictly monitors the budget policies and even small deficits above the 3%-target may be severely penalized. The Euro itself may act either as an economic straitjacket or as rocket-propeller. For the Italian economy in general it's rather a straitjacket, pushing up the imports and putting obstacles before the exports. For the real estate market however it's rather a rocket-propeller, pushing the prices up by double-digits, far above the general inflation rates of 2.0-2.5%. One possible explanation for this phenomenon is that the exchange rate, generally favoring the imports, makes Italy also a target for increased flow of foreign investments. With the domestic industries struggling to keep their exports, the investment flows are heading toward private consumption. With the consumer prices tending to converge with the general Eurozone levels, the real estate market remains one of few exceptions where inflation cannot be curbed by imports because of its very nature and the even higher price levels in some other Eurozone countries. The question to what extent Italy may keep its real estate market running at such high speed is in fact a question whether the country may be able to stay within the Eurozone despite the general economic recession it causes. It seems highly unlikely that the financial Euro-straitjacket will get looser any time soon. On the other hand, it also seems very unlikely that the Eurozone will allow one of its members to solve its problems by renegotiating its permanent exchange rate within the system. Such 'renegotiation' would in fact be impossible without reintroducing the Lira as parallel currency alongside the Euro. Some neo-liberal economists in Europe already advocate such reintroduction. Under some conditions it may be the less between the two bad options that the Italian government will face in order to get out of the crisis.
Italy profile: --------------------
See also the directory of companies providing real estate services in, and general real estate information of Italy.
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