Unemployment has been decreasing fast and job vacancies are continuing to grow. Latvia continues to lose workers through migration and more than 40% of all emigrants between 2009 and 2016 were high-skilled. This contributes to rising skill shortages. Along with a 13% rise in the minimum wage in 2018 this has fuelled wage growth, which is running at roughly 8%. Exporters still enjoy rising market shares and strong profitability, although continued increases in unit labour costs could ultimately undermine their competitiveness.

Macroeconomic policies are sound. The ECB’s policy interest rates are low and fiscal policy is broadly neutral , as the phasing in of personal and corporate income tax reform is compensated by higher excise taxes and spending restraint in some other areas.

While wage growth has been buoyant, for now, inflation looks stable and credit growth is weak. Core inflation has been firmly anchored around 2%. While private sector debt and non-performing loans have fallen fast to comfortable levels and the banking sector is well capitalised, credit growth remains close to nil. Banks remain cautious after heavy losses, partly caused by inefficient insolvency procedures, in the aftermath of the 2008 crisis. The widespread under-declaration of income also plays a role.

Anti-money laundering efforts have been stepped up. Latvia banned its banks from servicing certain types of high risk “shell companies” and oversaw a reduction in non-resident deposits by more than 60 % to reduce money-laundering risks. Based on recommendations of international experts (Moneyval, 2018) the new government, assisted by the OECD, works on implementing an action plan that would strengthen the quality and capacity of Latvia’s supervisory, control and law enforcement bodies and enhance international cooperation on anti-money laundering and combating of terrorism financing.

Income inequality and poverty remain high. Living standards have improved fast overall, but regional disparities in income per capita are pronounced. Social protection is limited and housing conditions are poor for a relatively large share of the population. Taxes and benefits could do more to lower inequality.

Personal income tax reform has lowered labour taxes for some lower-income households. Yet, a new social contribution earmarked for health spending has limited this effect. Taxes on higher-income workers and progressivity remain limited, as more than 90% of taxpayers pay the lowest rate of 20%. Social assistance remains low and while they improved, work incentives for accepting low wage jobs remain limited for benefit recipients.

Municipalities are relatively small. This undermines the provision of high-quality public services, including education and public transport. The government has initiated a territorial reform aiming at reducing the number of municipalities significantly. This should entail large efficiency gains and help address the deepening rural-urban divide.

Healthcare financing has increased from a low level, but a recent reform involves serious risks. Despite a fast increase life expectancy is still among the lowest in the OECD and highly unequal. A recent reform reduced high out-of-pocket payments that induce many patients to miss doctors’ appointments. But workers not paying mandatory social contributions and pensioners, who receive their pension from another country now have to pay a voluntary levy, otherwise they will be excluded from parts of the healthcare package, endangering their health. The new government’s proposal to abolish this levy and restore universal access to healthcare services is thus welcome.

Improvements in energy efficiency could provide for lower emissions. A lack of integrated land and transport planning has led to urban sprawl and limited the attractiveness of public transport. Most households are homeowners and many lack access to credit and financial resources to invest in energy efficiency. Homeownership associations have often been overwhelmed with complicated decision-making procedures and the logistics of energy efficiency investments, hindering a stronger uptake of dedicated EU and other public subsidies.

Latvia needs stronger productivity growth to improve living standards. This would help to counteract the effects of ageing and emigration of high-skilled workers. Productivity growth has slowed down after 2008, as the financial crisis impaired the credit channel impeding stronger capital deepening and investment in innovation. Shortages in skills needed to take up digital technologies and weak competition in some sectors with an important presence of state-owned and municipal enterprises (SOEs) hold back productivity, too.

High informality hinders stronger investment growth and inclusiveness. A widespread practice of under-declaration of income weighs on tax revenues, much needed to invest in education and infrastructure, on workers’ training opportunities and on firms’ access to finance. It also makes for patchy pension contribution records. The government is working to strengthen the capacity of the tax adminisitration and other law enforcement agencies, but progress with filling vacancies has been slow and lenient sentences continue to impede the fight against tax crime.

The very low recovery rate in insolvencies negatively affects access to credit and investment. Fraud with low penalties for abusers and low accountability of insolvency administrators eroded investors’ trust in the past. Recent insolvency administration reforms improve transparency and monitoring of proceedings, but trust in the independence of the judiciary and its capacity to deal with economic and other crimes should be strengthened. Encouraging swift initiation of insolvency proceedings could help restructure viable firms and liquidate unprofitable ones faster.

Governance of SOEs needs to improve to avoid undermining fair conditions for competition. The rationale for state ownership is not rigorously applied, preventing evidence-based decisions on privatisation. Enterprises owned by municipalities are not subject to the framework that monitors SOEs and ensures their good governance. Unlike in many OECD countries the competition authority cannot intervene against administrative acts that endanger fair conditions for competition.

Innovation performance is weak. Only a few firms innovate and R&D spending is relatively low. The supply of researchers and research quality are weak. Various measures to promote knowledge transfer are in place but researchers have little incentive to collaborate with industry. The government has reformed institutional financing to reward performance and promote consolidation. Taking these reforms further would improve efficiency and make room for higher wages and better working conditions for researchers to attract more qualified personnel.

Education and training have to become more responsive to labour market needs. Vocational training curricula have been updated with the involvement of social partners, a welcome move. But Latvia’s many small enterprises often lack the capacity to offer the full extent of work-based learning programmes. Promoting the provision of joint training could be a solution.

Participation in adult learning is increasing, but remains low among the low-skilled. Spending on active labour market policies has been shifted from public work schemes to more effective training and activation measures, but remains low.

Limited access to affordable housing in dynamic areas impedes access to jobs. Unemployment and income differences between Latvia’s regions are large, but buying a new home in booming areas is out of reach for most workers. Both the private rental and the social housing sectors are very small. The government plans to develop the private rental market by supporting access to long-term finance and housing with limits on rents, a welcome move.