By: Era Dabla-Norris, Davide Furceri, Zsuzsa Munkacsi, Galen Sher Spending more efficiently and reallocating public funds toward investment and innovation can be a powerful growth strategy Over the past two decades, Rwanda achieved remarkable progress. Nearly every household now has access to mobile phones and primary education. More than half the population has electricity, and one in five has clean drinking water and sanitation services. Rwandans consume three times more electricity and live 20 years longer. These gains came from relatively modest increases in investment,...

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The European labour market remains resilient, with low unemployment levels, despite a decline in employment growth, according to the European Commission's latest report. In 2024, job growth decreased to 0.8%, compared to 1.2% in 2023, as a result of economic pressure and geopolitical instability. Nevertheless, the unemployment rate in Europe remains near its record low. Despite welcomed progress over the last decade which saw certain sectors experience significant rises in pay, one in five workers remain in low-paying jobs. In 2024,...

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The FSB's 2024 AI report identified several vulnerabilities, including third-party dependencies, market correlations, cyber risks, and challenges in model risk and governance, which may have implications for financial stability Since the FSB’s 2024 report on the financial stability implications of artificial intelligence (AI), there have been significant developments in the AI ecosystem. These include advancements in AI models, new companies offering more flexible options, more competition in hardware, and global technology providers controlling more parts of the AI supply chain. These developments...

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By Agostino Consolo, António Dias da Silva, Maarten Dossche and Marco Weißler Do European workers see US tariff hikes as a threat to their job security? According to an ECB survey, while most workers are fairly relaxed, those in export-oriented sectors and those with lower incomes are more worried about their jobs than before the tariff increase. Trade tariffs between the euro area and the United States increased significantly this year. These tariffs increase the price of goods produced in Europe for...

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From today, sending money across the euro area will be faster and safer than ever. Thanks to new EU rules on instant payments, people and businesses can now transfer money in euro within seconds, anytime – day or night, weekdays or weekends – whether within their own country or across the euro area. Since January 2025, payment service providers (PSPs) in the euro area are obliged to offer their clients the possibility to receive euro instant payments. As of today, PSPs are also obliged...

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Artificial Intelligence (AI) is transforming how businesses operate, reshaping public services, and revolutionising science. AI has the potential to improve our lives in many ways. As the global race to harness its potential heats up, the European Commission has put forward two strategies that will help Europe stay ahead in AI industry and science respectively.  The Apply AI Strategy sets out how to speed up the use of AI in key industries and the public sector. It will be used to help the EU...

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NEW YORK—The Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s Center for Microeconomic Data today released the September 2025 Survey of Consumer Expectations, which shows that households’ inflation expectations increased at the short- and longer-term horizons and were unchanged at the medium-term horizon. Despite a small rebound in the expected job finding rate, labor market expectations continued to deteriorate with consumers reporting lower expected earnings growth, greater likelihoods of losing jobs, and a higher likelihood of a rise in overall unemployment. The...

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