Portugal (here, in Lisbon) is one of the rare countries in the euro zone, with Ireland and Cyprus, to generate a budget surplus. 260322581/Travellaggio – stock.adobe.com
DECRYPTION – These countries are giving lessons in budgetary seriousness to the rest of the euro zone, which is struggling to restore its public finances.
The Finance Ministers of the Twenty-Seven are meeting, Wednesday and Thursday, in Brussels, to discuss the reform of the budgetary rules of the euro zone. These criteria setting deficit (3% of GDP) and debt (60%) thresholds, suspended since the outbreak of Covid in 2020, must come into force on 1er January 2024. The only problem is that after months and months of tough negotiations, we still do not know which rules will apply: those of the stability and growth pact inherited from Maastricht, judged, by general opinion, to be obsolete? Or those, more flexible, of the reform proposed by the European Commission, acclaimed by high-spending countries, such as France or Italybut which arouse hostility in several capitals, starting with Berlin?
Result of this vagueness: the member countries of the euro zone presented to the Commission this autumn budget projects for 2024 which were not very voluntary on the reduction of deficits and debt. Especially since growth is weakening, then…
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