Unemployment is Europe's catastrophe. Many aspects of the European economy over the past half-century have been a triumph: rising standards of living, good working conditions, high productivity and good leisure provision. It is generally a competitive economy by world standards, for it includes what was until last year the world's largest goods exporter, Germany – which is now second to China. France has, quite aside from being the world's top tourist destination, the highest productivity per hour in the world. Italy has excellence in craft industries, Scandinavia in telecommunications and so on.
So Europe is not uncompetitive. It is just not very good at creating jobs. Unemployment is high by developed world standards: the eurozone average of 10 per cent is higher than the UK, Canada, Australia, Japan, and even a little higher than the US. It has also been persistent. For example, between 1995 and 2005 the average level of unemployment in France was 10.6 per cent.
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