Indebtedness in the Czech Republic and in some selected EU Countries

摘要

Nowadays we are witnessing an inconsistent approach to the question of where the critical level of indebtedness lies for each individual country and which economic and political changes can lead them to be classed as countries with serious problems [22]. Of increasing importance are the questions of what level of debt can be considered proper, whether it can be inferred using economic theories, or whether we need to concentrate on empirical data. In this article we would like to highlight the relativity of how indebtedness is assessed in the countries of Europe, especially those with a transitive economy, if the assessment is based on traditional indebtedness indicators. The Czech Republic, like most European countries, favours the principle of the welfare. A growing number of households in the Czech Republic are linked to public finance. This trend increases fears about whether the private sphere will be able to sustain this principle in the future from its taxes [12]. From statistical data it is evident that households in the Czech Republic are saving less and consuming more. This therefore raises the question of risky this behaviour is in combination with the rapid rise in debt [11]. The aim of this article is to provide information about the conclusions of an analysis of debt in the Czech Republic in comparison with selected transitive EEU economies, then to compare the household debt of transitive economies with the level of debt in German households. The analysis focuses on identifying the specifics of household debt in the Czech Republic and the risks implied by the rising level of debt with regard to the preference of the welfare-market economic model and the greater openness of the economy. Comparison of the indebtedness of households in the countries in question is based on data from OECD, Eurostat, the European Commission, the European Central Bank, the Czech Statistical Office, the Czech National Bank, Transparency International, and the World Bank.