At home, if we make a mistake when planning an expense, no one can save us: we get injunctions, fines, late payment interest. But there is a caste that lives on above all this and is dragging Italy into a sea of ​​debt: politicians, from the parliament to the regional councils, are never responsible for any damage caused by their choices. In any case, if things go badly, they cannot be re-elected. But in the worst case, they do not lose out of their own pocket: the money they pledge never belongs to them.

The issue is very sensitive because it is closely linked to the functioning of our democracy. But we have to ask ourselves the same question we would ask ourselves at Home whenever a huge event like the bridge over the Bosphorus (estimated at 11 billion so far) or a major event like the incredible Winter Olympics in Milan (120 meters above sea level, around 3 billion for now) is promised: Do we have enough money to cover this today? And if we don’t have it: who pays?

Today, whoever will pay the price of politics has no voice.

If the answer is to create a public debt to be paid in installments, this means that we are passing the cost on Italians who are still children and therefore have no right to choose. This is tantamount to forcing future citizens to spend a lifetime paying interest on today’s waste through taxes. This means making home mortgages more expensive and reducing the competitiveness of our businesses, because the money needed to finance research and development in Italy with these facilities will become increasingly expensive. Although it is difficult to remember the numbers, we all need to know them. Because this is our money. And our future.

Italian public debt rose from 134.8 percent of gross domestic product in 2019 to 142.9 percent in 2023, according to Confindustria’s forecast. Meanwhile, France increased from 98.1 percent to 112.4 percent, and Germany from 59.8 percent to 65.9 percent. Giorgia Meloni’s government has not reversed course for now. So much so that Confindustria predicts a growth of up to 143.4 percent of GDP for 2024. However, according to the stability pact between the euro zone states, we had to reduce this imbalance in the ratio of public debt to gross domestic product to 60 percent even before the epidemic.

Another percentage that weighs on all of us is related to the budget deficit or public deficit, that is, the difference between expenditure and income in the state coffers: in the second quarter of 2023, Italy reached 5.4 percent of GDP. According to the European stability pact, which is still being discussed in Brussels after it was suspended due to the epidemic, we should not exceed 3 percent.

Superbonus comedy costs 100 billion

In other words, after the ceiling of restrictions in Europe was lifted in the months of the Covid emergency – apart from the initial injection of money needed to restart the economy – the bulk of our politicians of all colors literally continued to pay no attention. at the expense of. We have seen this in the national comedy of extensions of Superbonus, which now weighs in the hundreds of billions. And also in Rome, $30 million was easily wasted to (not) get the international exhibition Expo 2030: the equivalent of a roulette bet with citizens’ money. Meanwhile, the fire at Tivoli hospital (photo above) and the deaths of three patients just a few kilometers from the capital show how primitive security systems still are.

However, this is not only the responsibility of politics. In fact, the recovery of tax and contribution evasion by Italians who do not pay taxes could almost completely close the gap within a year. In the “Unobserved Economy Report” published by the Ministry of Economy for 2023 (what a nice euphemism), it says: “96.3 billion euros, of which 84.4 billion is the loss of tax revenue, 11.9 billion is the loss of contribution income.” An amount equivalent to approximately 4.8 percent of Italy’s gross domestic product. But an effective recovery does not actually appear to be among the government’s priorities.

Beppe Grillo and Italian tax evasion

After all, 14 percent of Italians pay 66 percent of taxes paid to the government. As the latest report of the National Economic and Labor Council shows, 47 percent of citizens do not declare income. However, there is no trace of this in the speeches of the prime minister, his deputy Matteo Salvini, the most ardent supporter of spending on the bridge over the Bosphorus, and Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti.

Even in their wasteful elections, parliamentarians are protected by Article 68 of the Constitution: “Members of Parliament shall not be held responsible for the views they express or the votes they cast in the discharge of their duties.” However, Article 81 of the Constitution regulates “the balance between revenues and expenses of budgets and the sustainability of debt in public administrations as a whole”.

Why Meloni and Schlein argue about ESM – Antonio Piccirilli

A country’s economic reliability also depends on the competence of its representatives and the determination of everyone to pay their debts. “We had to choose someone from civil society. He was not a member of the movement. One day I met him. He is a handsome man, I like him compared to the average you see on TV. I graduated, I had a Madonna CV, I spoke English. Then he spoke and little was understood,” says Beppe Grillo (photo above), founder of the 5 Star Movement, on two-time prime minister Giuseppe Conte’s television. If these are the criteria for choosing a prime minister, why should other European governments save us?