The economic slowdown in Poland started affecting consumer confidence at the end of last year, according to unofficial data collected from Polish economists. As expected, GDP growth slowed to 2 percent during the last couple of months of 2012. Meanwhile, individual consumption dropped by 1 percent during the last few months. This has not happened since 1996.
“The decrease in consumption is an unpleasant surprise, resulting from the [weak] local labor market,” said Grzegorz Maliszewski of Millennium Bank. He said household incomes in Poland haven’t kept up with inflation over the last year. However, Total purchasing power for the corporate sector remains lower than in 2011, despite the drop in employment.
