Most problematic factors for doing business in Belgium 2017

This statistic shows the answers to a survey question on the most problematic factors for doing business in Belgium according to business executives in 2017. According to the respondents, tax rates were the leading problematic factor for doing business in Belgium. The concentration ratio, a measure of the percentage market share in an industry held by the largest firms within that industry, was 66.2 percent for banking in Belgium in 2016. The Belgian banking sector has two important characteristics. First, banking is deemed an important part of Belgian culture with a relatively high number of bank offices in the country. In 2015, for example, the total number of offices of banks established in Belgium reached 4,519 in the Flemish region. This is due to the fact that many banking offices in Belgium are managed by entrepreneurs who are not directly on the payroll of the bank itself. Consequently, the decrease of bank branches, which characterizes the financial sector in most European countries, happens at a slower rate. Between 2008 and 2015, the population serviced by one credit institution increased from approximately 102,000 people in 2008 to approximately 113,000 people in 2015.