September 14 (SeeNews) - Romania is the top performer in Southeast Europe (SEE) in terms of economic freedom, the Canada-based Fraser Institute said in its latest annual report published on Monday.
Romania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Albania are the only countries in SEE which improved their scores, The Economic Freedom of the World report, published on the institute's website, indicated.
The ranking measures the degree of economic freedom in five broad areas - size of government: expenditures, taxes, and enterprises; legal structure and security of property rights; access to sound money; freedom to trade internationally; and regulation of credit, labour, and business. The 2015 issue of the Economic Freedom report is based on data for 2013 for 157 countries.
Romania ranked 17th, up 5 places from last year. Its high score was largely due to its good performance in terms of access to sound money, which outweighed the results of the subindex designed to measure the extent to which regulations and bureaucratic procedures are affecting business and competition.
Bulgaria ranked 42nd, down from the 39th spot it occupied a year earlier due to unimpressive performance in the legal structure and security of property rights area.
Slovenia dropped to the 111th spot, from the 105th place a year earlier, as the country scored poorly in terms of size of government - the area which shows the share of government consumption in a country's budget. When that ratio is high, political choice is substituted for personal choice, Fraser Institute explained.
Slovenia's score was also low in terms of regulation of credit, labour, and business. Those ratings show that country's regulations restrict entry into markets and interfere with the freedom to engage in voluntary exchange, hence they reduce economic freedom.
Macedonia too fell in the rankings - to the 60th place from the 55th spot a year earlier - pulled down by its deteriorating performance in terms of size of government.
Albania advanced five places to the 62nd spot, after it improved its score in all areas.
Montenegro fell to the 62th from 53th place, mainly due to the larger share of government consumption.
Bosnia and Herzegovina climbed up to the 78th spot from the 85th place, largely thanks to its performance in terms of access to sound money.
Croatia declined to the 84th place, from the 78th spot, after its score in the government size and business regulation categories worsened.
Serbia fell to 101th place is its decline reflected its performance in the legal structure and security of property rights area.
Moldova ranked 103th place in the rankings, down from 94th, again due to low score in the legal structure and security of property rights area.