The vacuum effect of Madrid and the Spanish project
BarcelonaThe INE has published the GDP data for the year 2025, which confirm the phenomenon that has dominated the Spanish economy for decades: an ever-increasing concentration of economic activity and wealth in Madrid and an ever-widening gap between the capital of the Kingdom and the surrounding territories. If in the year 2000 the Madrid economy represented 17.5% of the Spanish total, in 2025 it has already reached 20%. In contrast, Catalonia keeps its share of the pie stable: it was 18.9% in the year 2000 and continues to be so 25 years later.
In these 25 years, there is one territory that has suffered a very notable deterioration due to the vacuum effect of Madrid, which is Castile and León, which represented 5.5% of the GDP in the year 2000 and is now 4.6%, almost a point less. But, curiously, there are two territories with dynamic economies that have also been affected by this phenomenon: these are the Basque Country, which has fallen from 6.3% to 5.7%, and the Valencian Community, which has retreated from 9.7% to 9.3%. In the second case, the construction of the motorway and the high-speed train (AVE) that connect the Valencian Community with the capital of the State has clearly benefited Madrid.
Where the gap is most painful, however, is in the GDP per capita. Madrid's, at 47,220 euros, doubles that of Melilla (22,302) and Ceuta (24,622). And it exceeds by more than 20,000 euros that of Andalusia (26,091), Extremadura (26,740), the Canary Islands (27,190), and almost its neighbor Castile-La Mancha (27,307). Is this really the Spanish project? A rich center and large areas of the interior that are poor and depopulated? With internal borders that separate two opposite worlds?
Catalonia, on the other hand, has resisted the vacuum effect much better than others, although it has seen how Madrid overtook it in terms of percentage of Spanish GDP, and also moved further away in terms of GDP per capita, with an 8,000 euro difference per inhabitant right now. What does not exist is any other territory that has grown in the proportion that Madrid has, which shows that the main factor is not so much the policies as the result of a strong investment in infrastructure to build a radial Spain, where everything passes through Madrid, to which the rest of the factors included in the so-called capital effect must be added.
Catalonia, however, cannot be content with avoiding being absorbed or having a subsidiary role, and must focus on growing in value-added activities. Because the uncomfortable question that hovers over this data is whether Catalonia would have resisted just as well without relying on tourism, an activity that produces wealth, yes, but also many externalities and does not create quality jobs. Madrid grows basically due to the service sector and because large companies prefer to be close to power, but Catalonia has an industrial fabric and an innovative ecosystem that should allow it to take a leap in scale. Mind you, being aware that the competition with Madrid is not and will never be, if things do not change a lot, fair.