The economy minister, Saccomanni, albeit with the prudence dictated by the need to operate with the methods and languages of politics, made it clear that the primary objective remains that of keeping the public finance balances unchanged in order to obtain from Brussels the exit from the excessive deficit procedure. Only in this way will we be able to have a further normalization of the financial market with the drop in rates both on public debt and, above all, on bank funding and therefore on loans to businesses and households. The recovery will arrive in the last quarters of the year, and it is hoped that it will be accelerated by the repayments of the debts of the PA to businesses on the basis of the decree passed by the previous government and which is now entering into operation. The agreements between companies and trade unions to increase productivity are also important, so much so that the funds allocated to reduce the taxation of productivity wages are only temporarily diverted in part to the funding of the Redundancy Fund but are destined to be promptly reintegrated in the autumn.
In short, a line is confirmed which refuses to entrust the hopes of economic recovery to public spending in deficit, as is claimed by many both inside and outside our country. And it is a good thing that this misunderstanding is dispelled as soon as possible in order to avoid useless controversies between the parties and above all in order not to feed illusions in the citizens about a possible windfall arriving from the ministry in via XX Settembre. After all, Krugman himself, the prophet of public spending, in his recent book limits himself to inviting Germany to relaunch its economy by increasing its deficit. but when he talks about Italy he doesn't say at all that for us the recipe could be different from that of austerity plus reforms. The more incisive the reforms, the less austerity will be needed.
And this is precisely the suggestion that the Government has not wanted or been able to follow: namely that of immediately tackling a vast plan of reforms starting from the institutional ones to arrive at those necessary to limit the excess of bureaucratization, or the proper functioning of markets hampered by too many corporations and oligopolies. It is clear that these are not reforms with an immediate impact, however their effect on changing expectations could be so important as to make possible much more aggressive moves on reducing the tax burden, such as those suggested by Alesina and Giavazzi in the Corriere della Sera , which could have a negative impact on the current deficit in the short term with the certainty, however, that it could be reabsorbed by the reforms already launched.
In other words, it is hoped that the Government has for now taken the time to study in detail a more aggressive strategy to be launched by the summer, perhaps with the help of a change of attitude on the part of the European authorities which should be decided in summit at the end of June. However, it would have been better to start immediately with measures aimed at reducing public spending carried out not with linear cuts but with a relaunch of the spending review, with the elimination of the provinces, with the cancellation of bureaucratic practices such as those in force in Italian ports which induce many of our operators to go and clear the goods in Amsterdam skipping Livorno or Genoa. Furthermore, a more precise signal on the desire to accelerate the sale of public goods, including those in the hands of local authorities, and greater attention to the competitiveness of companies through the revision of the Fornero law on the methods of entering the job and on the preference to be assigned would have been appropriate decentralized bargaining compared to national contracts. These are signs that not only would they not have led to new public expenditure, but rather would have laid credible premises so that the savings deriving from cuts in state expenditure can be returned to citizens and businesses with a parallel reduction in taxation.
In conclusion, today's decree serves only to defuse the political mine on the Imu and above all to reassure Europe that Italy has no intention of taking the path of easy spending, as happened in the spring-summer of 2011 when Berlusconi and Brunetta accused Tremonti saying that the PDL had lost the administrative elections due to the cuts in public spending made by the then economy minister. The actual maneuver has yet to be fine-tuned. It will be a hot summer for ministers.
