Abstrakt
Czechia would have no criteria-related problem entering the eurozone in the near future. There is, however, widely shared scepticism about the euro's effects on overall economic performance.
This translates into an implicit policy consensus on early euro non-adoption in the Czech debate, and a look at neighbouring Slovakia rather strengthens than weakens this view. The comparison with Slovakia shows that the euro had an immediate boosting effect on most of the economic indicators in comparison with Czechia but also that they cooled over time, which has rendered the overall long-term effect much more ambiguous.
Euro adoption has proved so far to produce no comparative advantage within the shared economic model because it has not enforced any solution to its long-term structural problems while the initial boosting factors have diminished over time, as evidenced by the post-crisis comparison.