Luxembourg's stable, high-income economy features moderate growth, low inflation, and low unemployment. The industrial sector, which was dominated until the 1960s by steel, has diversified to include chemicals, rubber, and other products. During the past decades, growth in the financial sector has more than compensated for the decline in steel. Services, especially banking and other financial exports, account for the majority of economic output. Luxembourg is the world's second largest investment fund center (after the USA), the most important private banking center in the Eurozone and Europe's leading center for reinsurance companies. Moreover, the Luxembourgish government has tried to attract internet start-ups. Skype, Jajah and eBay are only a few of the many internet companies that have shifted their local or global headquarters to Luxembourg.
Agriculture is based on small, family-owned farms. Luxembourg has especially close trade and financial ties to Belgium and the Netherlands (see Benelux), and as a member of the EU it enjoys the advantages of the open European market. Luxembourg possesses the highest GDP per capita in the world (US$87,995 as of 2006), the eighteenth highest Human Development Index, and the fourth highest rated in the quality of life index. As of March 2006, unemployment is 4.8% of the labor force. For the fiscal year of 2005 and 2006, Luxembourg has run a budget deficit for the first time in many years, mostly because of slower international economic growth.
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