Warsaw will continue outstripping other Polish regions

Outlook

In terms of GDP per capita (at PPS), the Mazowieckie region, which is centred on Warsaw, surpassed the EU average in 2011, and has extended its lead over other Polish regions since. Dolnoslaskie (centred on Wroclaw) and Wielkopolskie (Poznan) come closest but show no signs of closing the gap.

Mazowieckie is Poland’s largest region, which partly accounts for its share of Poland’s gross fixed capital formation, but it is also an example of the ‘capital effect’, whereby capital cities are usually (but not always) the richest cities in any country. Capital cities draw in labour and have more business and financial services firms, hence the city’s higher-than-average wages -- 6006 zloty (1,597 dollars)/month in Warsaw (August 2018), compared with 3,991 in Bialystok.

Impacts

• EU cohesion funds will continue to narrow the gap between GDP per head in the eastern and western parts of the EU.
• However, a wide gap is also opening between Warsaw and less successful regions, mostly in eastern Poland, which could store up resentment.
• Socio-political divisions could widen between successful Western-oriented regions and Eurosceptic ‘left-behinds’ vulnerable to populism.