For me, one of the most important items for predicting economic growth and future prosperity is a countries increase in ranking or position on the below mentioned table:
http://cpi.transparency.org/cpi2012/results/
The Netherlands ranked 7th in 2010/2011 and decreased to a 9th position in 2012. Lets hope this has been a temporary decline.
Please have a look for yourself how the GIIPS are ranked compared to Germany, Netherlands, Austria, Denmark etc. This is Europe 🙂
