国际英语资讯:News Analysis: Business, consumer confidence improves in Italy, but economy remains moribund_时事

国际英语资讯:News Analysis: Business, consumer confidence improves in Italy, but economy remains moribund

Poma said that economic growth is predicted to remain slow through the end of the year, and that most of the most important macroeconomic indicators tell a similar story.

"If business and consumer confidence are the main reasons to be more optimistic about the economy then I will wait a few months to see if the trend started in July continues," he noted.

The only positive indicator besides business and consumer confidence involved the country's unemployment figures, which have stubbornly remained above 10 percent in recent months. But the latest figures, for June, showed the figure dipped to 9.7 percent, its lowest level in seven years.

But according to Giampaolo Galli, an economist and vice director of the Italian Observatory of Public Accounts, even that figure is less optimistic than it appears at first glance.

"The economy added enough new jobs to drop the unemployment figures by 0.5 percent," Galli said in an interview. "But the only demographic group to see its situation improve were workers aged 50 or above. Every other age group saw the employment situation worsen for them."

Like Poma, Galli said there was too little information to determine whether improving confidence in the economy was the start of a trend.

"Business or consumer confidence on their own don't mean much," Galli said, adding "Let's wait and see if that starts to make a difference with economic growth."