Inflation and bills, the high cost of living costs 12 billion

The rush in energy prices continues to squeeze household budgets and erode Italians’ purchasing power. That they are about to lose, in the second half of 2022 alone, 12.1 billion in purchasing power. That is, about 470 euros less per unit in a single semester. The Confesercenti Economic Office yesterday estimated the sting. Which explains how the worsening economic situation is linked, first of all, to the record increases recorded in the energy bill during the summer. Increases that will be dumped right into autumn’s electricity and gas bills, pushing prices up to the highest levels of the year. Thus, according to the estimates of the merchants association, the inflation rate will rise on average over the next three months to at least 9.1%, more than half a point above the already high value for the summer period (+ 8.4 %) and three more points compared to the spring period. To combat this protracted rise in the cost of living, households have geared up and used their savings so far, which have already dropped 2.3 points in their share of GDP in the spring. The margins available to consumers are now reduced to the blink of an eye. The evolution of employment, with the value of August showing a decrease of 110 thousand units compared to the end of spring, does not allow for any increase in disposable income, and the increase in interest rates limits the possibilities linked to credit. Even if the trend of using the liquidity accumulated in recent years was maintained, therefore, in the second half of this year Italians could not put more than 8.9 billion in savings on their plate. An impressive amount of resources, but insufficient to compensate for the drop in purchasing power, with a deadweight loss of consumption estimated at more than 3 billion euros in the last quarter of the year. And this on the assumption – optimistic – that employment does not fall further and that the inflation rate remains below the European average. In this context, the priority continues to be to stop the race in energy tariffs, in order to preserve the purchasing power of families and contain the boom in fixed costs for companies, the main driver of the rise in prices. But the likely drop in spending represents yet another criticality for commercial distribution activities, which expect to experience a colder Christmas – from a consumption point of view – from 2020, the year of the pandemic. It is therefore necessary to continue to intervene to cushion the shock due to the escalating energy crisis. There are resources: between inflation and rising gas, energy and fuel prices, in the first eight months of the year, VAT receipts increased by more than 18 billion. Resources destined to increase even more in the last part of the year, and that must be returned to the economy in the form of support to companies and families.