(CNS): The Cayman Islands economy is doing well with GDP growth at 3.7% and estimated at US$70,790 per capita, the creation of over 8,900 jobs post-pandemic, an unemployment rate down to 3.6% among local people, a human development index of 0.877 and a $40million surplus for public finances. Nevertheless, there are a number of significant challenges facing this country, Premier Wayne Panton told a business audience on Thursday. In an address at the RF Economic Outlook Conference, he said the cost of living “was staggeringly high and thousands of people here subsist on low wages”.
Panton said that the Cayman Islands was “very prosperous” by any measure. But while salaries in some sectors, especially financial services, were very high, the poor wages of others in the face of the high cost of living and rising interest rates were making it harder for them to make ends meet.
“With the forecast increase in…