Corruption and economic resilience: recovery from the financial crisis in western economies

We consider the resilience of a group of 20 Western economies after the financial crisis of the late 2000s . We measure resilience by the growth of real GDP between 2007 , the previous peak level , and 2015 . The countries exhibit a broad range of experience , from a rise in GDP of 18 per cent in Australia to a fall of 26 per cent in Greece . A substantial proportion of the differences in growth rates can be accounted for by just two variables : the perceived level of corruption and membership of the Eurozone . The euro did have a negative impact on the recovery paths of the Mediterranean economies ( Greece , Italy , Portugal and Spain ), but their perceived corruption scores in 2007 had a bigger impact , especially on the first three of these economies .