Contributions of the programs of the European Union and entrepreneurship to the decisions regarding the structural changes, the growth and competitiveness in Romania

Abstract: The economic growth reported annually, from 2012 to the present, is accompanied by the paradox of Romania’s fall in most of the global rankings in the reports of the world dedicated to competitiveness, which determines us to appreciate that this growth is not based on supporting elements of sustainable growth at the level of the real economy. The competitiveness of a nation depends directly on the quality of life of its citizens, and on the competitiveness of the company depends the level of performance of the economic-financial indicators and implicitly the welfare of the employees. The loss of positions in the global rankings shows that despite the quantitative advance of the GDP, of the efforts to recover the development gaps, other nations manage to advance faster than us in improving the quality of the investment, administrative, health, education, and living environment day by day. The deficit of foreign trade exceeded 6.7 billion euros in 2018, a deterioration of over two thirds compared to the previous year, and the imbalances continue to deepen in 2019. The deficit of trade in goods and services contributes 71% to the current account deficit the year last. General goods make a negative contribution of over 14.8 billion euros to this deficit, and the surplus of services over 8.1 billion euros partially balances the balance (NBR, 2019). While at European level, the average budget allocated to research and development activities is 2% of GDP, in Romania it is 0.5% of GDP, of which 0.16% is government expenditure, 0.05% sector expenditure of tertiary education and 0.29% private financing (Eurostat 2018). Romania’s economy seems to be trapped in middle-income countries, that is, those countries that have not exhausted the potential for extensive economic growth, but have not developed the capacity to capitalize and capitalize on investment, innovation and competitive differentiation in order to it reaches among the developed states. Keywords: European Union, funds, economic growth, competitiveness JEL Classification: F63, M21, O4