Can the euro zone's structural unemployment rate be measured?

Knowing the euro zone's structural unemployment rate would be very useful in order to ascertain:

    - The extent to which monetary policy (demand-side policies) should become more expansionary;

    - How far the cyclical recovery is able to drive down unemployment (for example to make budget forecasts, projections for equilibrium in pension systems);

    - In what proportions demand-stimulus and supply-stimulus policies should be used.

    Two simple methods can be used to try to measure the structural unemployment rate:

    - By beginning with pre-crisis structural unemployment and trying to measure the magnitude of the loss of potential GDP due to the crisis;

    - By looking at the level of unemployment at which euro-zone inflation (underlying, domestic) begins to fall.

    This leads to an estimate of the euro zone’s structural unemployment rate of around 9.5%, compared with the current unemployment rate of 12%: only 2.5percentage points of unemployment can be corrected by the recovery in demand.