The League pays a pledge to the Five Stars for the rescue of its leader Matteo Salvini in the Diciotti case and bows its head on the TAV effectively accepting the postponement, even if the Minister of Economy Giovanni Tria reiterates that "the TAV is done". This is the gist of a motion presented yesterday by the government majority in the Chamber which has unleashed the opposition and the entrepreneurs of the North and which exposes Italy to yet another international bad figure and which risks costing dearly.
But, beyond the parliamentary motion, it is the cost-benefit analysis of the Ponti ministerial commission on the Tav that is not convincing and continues to cause discussion. Too many doubts about the method and merit. But how things really are and how an independent economist like Stefano Micossi, general manager of Assonime, sees them. FIRSTonline asked him. Here are his answers.
Dr. Micossi, on the TAV there is a furious clash between cost-benefit analyzes and counter-analysis. As an economist, what do you think?
"I try to summarize as a non-expert what I have left of the public discussion on the TAV: Minister Toninelli appointed an independent commission made up of a well-known anti-TAV, Professor Marco Ponti, two or three of his collaborators in a consultancy firm on transport, and an outsider who then published his minority report with quite the opposite conclusion. An editorial comment on Corsera has cast some shadows on the professional correctness of prof. Ponti, who according to that comment is against all motorway works except the one for which he was a consultant. Now it is being whispered that Toninelli wants to fire him, perhaps precisely because of those accusations. Furthermore, the analysis does not mention the previous studies of the European Commission, with which it would have been normal to deal with”.
The (majority) analysis of the Ponti Commission seems to perform some daring acrobatics: what does not convince you of its conclusions?
“The Commission also includes among the costs those that fall on the French taxpayer. If you remove the French part, the estimated costs of the work fall by half or less. It treats the shifting of traffic from road to rail as "negative externalities", attributing the presumed drop in motorway tolls and excise duties on lower petrol consumption to the costs of the work; if these costs are also removed, the balance approaches zero; if I'm not mistaken, at least in words our government in its transport plans includes the objective of reducing road traffic, in favor of rail and sea traffic; the underlying assumption of constant traffic is hard to share.
He estimates a useful life of the work of 40 years, which seems rather short to most and uses rather high discount rates; the total effect of less adverse assumptions may be small, but it would certainly lower net costs. Most importantly, it is based on a very conservative traffic estimate – many believe that one of the reasons for the low rail traffic through the currently used Fréjus pass is due to the unfavorable characteristics of the alternative pass, which is characterized by steep gradients (up to 30% ) which limit the range of trains. The calculations exclude the financial costs of giving up the work, as well as the reputational costs for our country of violating international treaties voted by Parliament and commitments undertaken with the European Commission - which has already paid our government substantial funds".
