US recovery seen outpacing Europe in 2010

[November 19, 2009]  PARIS (AP) -- The world's rich and developed economies will grow faster next year, but recovery will remain modest, with the U.S. and Japan outpacing Europe, a Paris-based watchdog said Thursday as it raised its forecasts.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development more than doubled its estimate for 2010 growth in its 30 member countries -- which include the U.S., Japan, Germany and the United Kingdom -- to 1.9 percent.

Still, the recovery is expected to remain fragile.

"In most OECD economies, growth is likely to fluctuate around a modest underlying rate for some time to come," said the organization's top economist, Jorgen Elmeskov, in an editorial.

"It is being held back by still substantial headwinds. It is only some time down the line that the recovery will become sufficiently strong to begin to reduce unemployment."

The OECD also reduced the expected contraction this year to 3.5 percent from an earlier forecast of 4.1 percent. The organization publishes its economic outlook twice a year, although it updated some 2009 forecasts in an interim assessment published in September.

The U.S. economy has been boosted by stimulus measures, improving financial conditions, demand from the fast-growing non-OECD economies of Asia -- especially China -- and the stabilization of the housing market, the OECD said. It predicted unemployment will start to ease after peaking in the first half of 2010.

It predicts the U.S. economy will expand at a rate of 2.5 percent in 2010, up from a June forecast of 0.9 percent. It also expects a smaller contraction this year: a 2.5 percent fall in output compared with an interim September forecast of a 2.8 percent drop.

In Europe, the economies of the 16 countries sharing the euro are now expected to grow by 0.9 percent next year compared to a June forecast of zero growth. However, the OECD predicts a greater contraction of 4 percent this year, more than the 3.9 percent it calculated in September.

Unemployment is not set to peak before the end of 2010 or the beginning of 2011, and is likely to sap the strength of recovery, the OECD said.

Japan's economy will grow by 1.8 percent next year compared with the June forecast of 0.7 percent. The OECD reduced prediction for a contraction this year to 5.3 percent compared to a 5.6 percent rate seen in September.

Elmeskov said central banks should keep interest rates low and should beware of the dangers of deflation, while governments should work on plans to reduce debt levels as the economy recovers.

As growth picks up, policy makers will need to mop up some of the excess liquidity caused by policies designed to keep credit markets open when they threatened to freeze during the peak of the crisis.

The OECD suggests phasing out banks' use of funding guarantee schemes by making them more expensive rather than ending them, to avoid having to reintroduce them in case of renewed instability, which could undermine confidence.

International coordination will be needed to roll back extended deposit insurance "as few countries may be willing to move ahead alone with a measure that could weaken the competitiveness of domestic banks," it said.

[Associated Press; By EMMA VANDORE]

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