We already lost it, they cry on social networks, referring to the president. The memes riddle him with mockery about the stamps that he carries in his wallet, the media and commentators disqualify and ridicule the economic measures announced by the president, the businessmen have begun to talk about taking on the task of saving Mexico because the president did not understands economics. The unanimity is overwhelming: López Obrador is lost in his own reality, in a country that only exists in his head.
However, the most recent survey (that of the newspaper El Financiero , which no one could accuse of being an amloist), shows that 60% of Mexicans still approve of it. Something that is hard to believe just by looking at any public, private or virtual conversation between the middle and upper classes, where the adverse consensus of the 4T is little less than absolute.
Consult other texts by Jorge Zepeda Patterson
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López Obrador lives another reality than ours and they are right about that. The problem is believing that ours is the only one, or even that it is the predominant one. The President came to power thanks to the vote of and on behalf of the economically and socially marginalized. According to Coneval, a third of Mexicans do not have enough income to cover the basic food basket. A reality that is not "ours"; yes that of the Mexican president.
The president has never hidden that his intention is to seek a massive transfer of resources in favor of the poor, and to do so without destabilizing or violating the country. A mission that many of us who vote for it assume not only as a moral imperative for the unprotected, but also as an act of political and social prudence. If extreme disparity was not addressed, there was a risk that desperation, resentment and violence would erupt in a bad way. López Obrador is the answer to this need.
Another thing is that the character has turned out to be more picturesque, rude and provocative than necessary. But the premise continues to hold, the peculiarities of his personality are more in the form than in the background, except for social networks and columnists who live to massacre the occurrence or the presidential nonsense of each day. The bottom line remains the same: obsession with improving the condition of those below without violating social order or private property.
The pandemic by Covid-19 and its vicissitudes has only deepened these two indissoluble "realities" abysmally. When the president affirms that he will face the crisis with subsidies for 22 million elderly, young people without resources and people in precarious conditions, or announces that 2.1 million credits will be granted to the micro company, the private initiative. he concludes that López Obrador has condemned the country to tragedy. They demonstrate, to demonstrate this, the economic packages announced in other nations with fiscal incentives for companies, support for the wages of unemployed workers and massive credits for the recovery of business. In short: there is protection and a plan for the recovery of the productive plant; here, on the other hand, only populist and electoral subsidies for momentary consumption.
However, things are more complex. A closer look reveals, again, two mutually incomprehensible optics, but both consistent with their own reality. López Obrador's proposal could not be wrong and even be more accurate, under certain premises. I ask reader, a little of your patience.
In France or Germany the productive plant, employment and production, resides in the formal sector. The best way to protect people's income and well-being is by turning state support in favor of public and private companies and the workers who work in them. But that is not the case in Mexico. There are 57 million economically active people in the country, only 20.1 million of them are registered in the IMSS. It is estimated that around 54% of the working population does so in the informal sector, that is, it would not be included in the “rescue” package that employers ask for. Microenterprises (in which 1 to 10 people work) represent 94% of businesses in Mexico and employ just over 40% of formal jobs. Many other jobs do not even enter this register (for example, that of domestic workers cleaning houses from “the other reality”). In short, almost seven out of every 10 Mexicans who work are self-employed, work in scrap yards or in small companies. The overwhelming majority of people are not on the payroll of the Government or a medium or large company. Most likely, it operates in a business that does not pay taxes or evades a good part of them by staying under the radar. In this context, what does a suspension of the payment of personal and business taxes mean, as requested by the private initiative? In practice, a transfer of resources from the seven that operate in the precarious sector to the three that work for the formal sector of the economy; a subsidy charged to all for the benefit of medium and large companies. The money that the government would stop receiving would have to be obtained from cutting public services and social support to the most vulnerable (or financed with public debt that would simply delay the same result, because sooner or later the government would have to pay it. ). That the payment of electricity, water and gas to households is condoned, as in France, sounds attractive but, again, that measure would be charged to the thousands of homes that are not registered in these public services; those of the other "reality". However, the large company concentrates around 20% of formal employment, but produces just over 60% of the value of the "accounting" production. The Government is clear that a long confinement would end up affecting everyone as a whole. The bet, without saying it, is to minimize the quarantine; the minimum to avoid that the patients collapse the hospitals as in Quito. For the authorities, it is much more urgent that those seven out of 10 workers take to the streets to earn a living again. They are the 2 million credits to micro businesses (formal and informal), in addition to supporting 22 million unprotected or in precarious condition. The employer and his employees and workers are being asked for a sacrifice, it is true, but in proportion it is not greater than that requested from a taquero or a waiter who will stop receiving any income for a month.
We are on new ground. The virus is the same, but countries are not. Each one must make an approach according to their reality, well, in the case of Mexico, its two realities. Everyone is going to lose; Only time will tell if López Obrador's proposal was convenient, but at the time it would have to be compared with Argentina, Brazil or Colombia. Not with Germany as it is now being done.
International financial organizations are already wondering if some of the emerging countries could incur a worse debt crisis than the one suffered in 1989, as a result of the announced rescue packages. If your forecast is correct, the Government of Mexico will not be in that case. This Tuesday The New York Times published a note on the two realities in Italy: while the industrial north has suffered the bulk of the deaths, the south is on the way to social and economic tragedy, precisely because the support plan does not reach good part of the population.
The president is lost in his own country, but in a way many of his critics also gloat in his. The question is where the majority of Mexicans live and who should have preference in times of anguish and calamity.
@jorgezepedap
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