At last Tuesday's meeting of economists and specialists in the social area of the PRO, the UCR, and the Civic Coalition, something became clear: technicians mistrust politicians.
There are no volunteers who want to step forward
: everyone knows that the Prime Minister of the Economy will be the most ephemeral and that only in 2025 will the Argentine economy be able to navigate with some calm.
The first semester of 2024 will be, they assure, hard, with
adjustment, recession and even more inflation
.
This is how one of the protagonists of the meeting summed it up for this newspaper.
"The dirty task is to devalue, raise the prices of rates, fuel and everything that is in arrears," he explains.
And he adds more data: "It will be necessary to promote
a reform of the Organic Charter of the Central Bank
to limit the monetary emission and, finally, a policy of recovery of income that passes like an ambulance to pick up the wounded".
The drop in spending will have a sharp cut in public works, there will be policies to
reduce state employment and early retirement plans
and a strong cut in subsidies for energy, transport and companies.
"The model has to be successful quickly because if it doesn't, the political support is going to be diluted," says one of the editors of the document.
On the withholdings there are small disagreements: the representatives of Horacio Rodríguez Larreta propose, as a gesture,
lowering those of the regional economies
(but not those of soybeans, sunflowers and wheat).
Patricia Bullrich's men talk about
dropping three points per year
and Marina Dal Poggetto, who accompanies Facundo Manes, believes that we must get out of the stocks quickly, unify exchange rates and
raise withholdings, not lower them
.
There will be a renegotiation of the agreement with the Fund and the Organic Charter of the BCRA will be modified to once again put limits on the issuance and financing by the Central to the Treasury.
Regarding the social plans, the idea is
to modify the Potenciar Trabajo
(aimed at those who work in cooperatives or other productive units)
and the Alimentar Card
(which grants a monthly amount for the purchase of food).
Potenciar Trabajo today has 1,200,000 beneficiaries who earn half the minimum wage ($40,171 in May).
What was discussed and agreed was:
-Eliminate intermediation (social organizations are removed from the environment).
-Set a term for the benefit (which could be one year with a six-month extension)
-In that year the beneficiary will be obliged to train in a trade or finish his education and to appear monthly at the employment offices to receive job offers.
If the person rejected more than three job offers, he would be left without a social plan.
That of public companies is one of the great expenses to touch: last year they had a deficit of US$ 6,500 million, almost one point of GDP.
There are 34 state companies, but spending is concentrated in ENARSA, State Railway Operator, Aerolíneas Argentinas, AySA, Correo Argentino, Belgrano Cargas, RTA and Yacimientos Carboníferos Río Turbio.
ENARSA leads the deficit with US$3.2 billion in 2022 and Trains is the largest company in the public sector: it has 30,600 agents.
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