Ekonomická výkonnost a trh práce v kontextu ekonomické krize: zkušenosti ze zemí Visegradské čtyřky

Generally, economic performance declines and the unemployment rate rises during the economic crisis. This relationship was confirmed in the past several crises. The last one started in 2008. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the impact of the crisis on economic performance and functioning of the labour market in the Visegrad group countries. Real gross domestic product and the unemployment rate are the main analyzed indicators. Quarterly data from the Eurostat database in the period between 2000 and 2010 were used. In order to estimate potential output and the natural rate of unemployment was used Hedrick-Prescott filter. Data shows that all V-4 economies in precrisis period were in the positive output gap. It means that the factors of production are used with such intensity that was regardless of the subsequent economic crisis unsustainable in the long term. In assessing the impact of economic crisis on the Visegrad group economies, it was found that the smallest impact of the crisis was on the Polish economy, whose economic performance has fallen at least among EU Member States during the crisis. Moreover, the labour market was in the positive unemployment gap in the pre-crisis period. Within the paper, one objective was also to estimate relationship between economic performance and the unemployment rate. The VAR model was used as the main method for calculations. As shown in each equation, the change in quarterly growth rates of real GDP and the quarterly change in the unemployment rate, there is an inverse relationship, which is consistent with the economic theory.