Over the last seven years, Romania has been leading the way in the EU in terms of price hikes. Since 2005 until the end of 2012, prices rose 50.8 percent, about 7 percent a year. According to hotnews.ro, that’s twice the European average.
Besides layoffs and wage cuts, this made inflation one of the top concerns for most Romanians, whereas other EU member countries have maintained far more stable price environments.
These include Sweden (14 percent), The Netherlands (14.2 percent), France (14.4 percent), Germany (14.8 percent), Portugal (16.4 percent), and Denmark (16.5 percent).