[Wuhan Pneumonia] He Yicheng sends five strokes of sugar to rescue Hong Kong

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Written by: Comment Editor

2020-02-14 17:30

New pneumonia hits the economy. The Macau SAR government announced a number of temporary economic assistance measures on Thursday (13th), including tax reductions, consumer vouchers, "plus" medical vouchers, SME assistance programs, and cash sharing. The budget involved a total of about 27 billion yuan, hoping to stabilize Macau ’s economy and protect employment. Macau's decisive and swift response to the epidemic teaches people to appreciate that this "Macau speed" is also a lesson for the Hong Kong government.

The Macau government has taken economic measures to respond to the epidemic since the end of last month, including including the "cash sharing plan" originally scheduled to be issued from July to September this year, issued in advance from April to June, and leased to the government from February Rental of properties such as shopping malls, service kiosks, and restaurants is free for 3 months. As the epidemic situation becomes more severe, the Macau government has recently stepped up again, throwing out five major economic strains and mitigation measures in one breath, including tax reduction and exemption, the implementation of small and medium-sized enterprises assistance and interest subsidies, strengthening of people's livelihood measures, and supporting vulnerable families. , Improving skills training, implementing work-for-work, and launching consumer electronics to accelerate the economic recovery of the people's livelihood.

`` Sweet sugar '' is not without logic

The Macao government, which is famous for sending money, mainly adopts "send sugar" in economic measures. The outside world is familiar with this, but this does not mean that the Macao government is full of medicine and stone. For example, in assisting SMEs affected by the impact, the Macau government has launched two loans and assistance programs to provide loans of up to 2 million for SMEs that have been short of funds due to the epidemic, and to provide exemptions of up to 600,000 patacas. Interest assistance loans and a maximum repayment period of 8 years, so "heavy medicine" is believed to effectively relieve the pressure on SMEs and employees. As for the people ’s livelihood, the Macau government will issue an additional 600 patacas worth of medical treatment to Macao residents for epidemic prevention, and subsidize three months' electricity bills for residential houses, as well as two additional months of assistance to vulnerable families receiving economic assistance from the Social Work Bureau. It can be seen that in addition to generously subsidizing the needs of the public, the government has not forgotten to take measures to address more needy communities.

When it comes to the Macao government's economic assistance, of course, "the people send money." In addition to the early disbursement of money, the Macau government also launched an "electronic consumer card". After the epidemic has eased, the government will issue an electronic consumer coupon of 3,000 yuan each to Macao residents. This voucher will be issued in the form of a special voucher card, and the daily spending limit of each person is 300 yuan, and can be deducted in the catering, retail, lifestyle and other industries. The Macau government hopes to stimulate domestic demand and increase consumption to stabilize the market.

The government has always raised doubts about the effects of increasing domestic demand by sending money and spending money for a limited time. After all, citizens' willingness to consume is not only affected by the amount of disposable income, the social atmosphere is still very important. The government distributed consumer spending only after the epidemic eased, but many citizens ’families’ economies were affected as the epidemic lasted. Citizens may use consumer spending to meet daily necessities in order to save more disposable income in order to avoid In time, it may not actually increase the extra consumer demand.

But from another perspective, even if the government "sends money" fails to effectively stimulate domestic demand, sending money as a subsistence allowance to ease the pressure of citizens' living expenses will undoubtedly still play a very important role. Taking the gaming industry as an example, Macau last Wednesday (5th) announced the suspension of all casinos and entertainment venues for 15 days due to the epidemic. Considering that the gaming industry is the economic lifeline of Macau, it employs close to 86,000 people, and the overall entertainment and gaming and other services The industry also accounts for 24.9% of the total employed population, which shows that the impact is profound. The Macao government has not hesitated in responding, and promptly put forward support measures. Even if the policy is not perfect, the government always makes a decisive and prompt judgment and response to the epidemic changes, which helps to stabilize society's confidence in the economic prospects. The approach is worthy of recognition.

Macau Chief Executive Edmund Ho announced that Macau would close the casino for half a month. (Macao News Bureau)

Hong Kong Government can no longer sigh

Government work has been compared by the outside world with the Macao government, the former often seems hesitant and hesitant. So far, the Hong Kong Government has not announced any assistance measures in response to the epidemic, and once again lags behind the "Macao Speed". It is true that the Hong Kong Government has the responsibility to use public funds cautiously, to avoid the indiscriminate use of medicines and stones, and to use public funds properly. However, in view of the anti-revision legislation last year, the government ’s measures to reduce people ’s livelihood have not only fallen behind the social situation repeatedly Needs, and more importantly, its measures lack quality and fail to truly anxious the citizens.

What's more, in the past six months, the local economy has suffered a lot. UBS released a report last week predicting that this year's local economic growth will be further reduced from 0.5% to 1.8%. The government must take more active economic and people's livelihood measures. Of course, the government does not need to imitate all the people in Macau, and it does not need to use it as a political tool to please the people. However, in contrast, the Hong Kong Government has to come up with a more convincing deployment to alleviate the pressure on the public, show the public the determination of the government and the people, and must not pervert the public with minor repairs.

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