Sektor usług a wahania koniunktury. Przypadek gospodarki Polski

Abstract

The process of economic development is connected with systematic structural change in most countries. The service sector expansion is a next evolution stage of economies. As per capita income rises, the primary sector (agriculture) loses in importance, while the manufacturing industry dominates, but after period of time is eventually surpassed by the constantly growing service sector. In this paper two hypothesis are checked for Polish economy: whether the service sector can play a role of leading indicator of the business cycle, as well as, if during recession service sector reaction to overall economic situation is less sensitive than in the rest of economy. In the first part of the article theories and mentioned above hypothesis on the service sector behaviour during business cycle are described, the second part includes description of the Polish service sector and its structural changes in the last decade, and finally, third part presents results of the research.