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Video: France. Reforms Could Disappoint

Global Economy, Media, On the cover, Sin categoría

The problem of France is to recover the dynamism lost in an economy that Macron himself described as “sclerotic” . There are many doubts about his true reformist agenda, evidenced by his actions when he has been minister. But we have to give him the benefit of the doubt. He faces a radicalized parliament, with traditional parties in disarray.

Reducing corporate tax, cutting labor costs, carrying out a labor reform similar to the Spanish one, and immigrant integration policies are part of Macron’s proposals, but we must wait to see if he wins the second round and if he has the support to implement them.

The challenge is enormous.

Just fifteen years ago, Germany and France had similar deficits and debts. Germany took the road of reforms and France the “ostrich policy”, ignoring its imbalances, attacking its own waterline with confiscatory tax and spending policies to sustain a hypertrophied public sector.

The last time France had a balanced budget was in 1980, and since 1974 it has never generated a surplus, public debt reached 96% of GDP, the economy has been stagnating for two decades, unemployment stands at 10% (with 23.6% youth unemployment ) and in 2017 it still has a current account deficit of 6.5 billion euros while the Eurozone has a surplus. Germany, on the other side, has a budget surplus, growth, much less unemployment (3.9%) and lower debt (71%). The French candidates have blamed the country’s problems on external enemies, from ‘globalization’ to ‘the euro’, however, comparisons with Germany destroy those arguments. It is hilarious to listen to LePen or Melenchon, the Ying and Yang of extremism, blaming France’s problems on “budget cuts” or “austerity . “

In a country where public spending exceeds 57% of GDP, where public administration spending has grown by more than 13% since 2008 and 22% of the active population works for the State, local governments and public entities, talking of austerity is a bad joke. In addition, France has spent tens of billions on ‘stimulus plans’ since 2009 . Specifically, 47 billion euro in 2009, 1.24 billion to the automotive industry and two ‘growth plans’ under the Hollande mandate: 37.6 billion euro (‘investments’) and 16.5 billion (‘technology’).

Blaming the French stagnation on “neoliberalism”, “austerity” or “the euro” is like an obese person blaming his overweight on lack of more donuts.

The problem is economic “dirigisme” -interventionism-, which stifles the potential of a rich nation that should not be satisfied with having better economic data than the periphery of Europe. France should be compared to the world’s leading economies. The problem that the next president of France faces is that, repeating the mistakes of the past, the country will not regain the dynamism of a nation that should not be content with secular stagnation and perpetuating imbalances.

Unfortunately, the results of the past elections have shown us that a large part of the electorate thinks that “dirigiste” socialism has not worked because the country needs a lot more of it. A large part of the electorate prefers to believe that two plus two add up to twenty-two and that they will be richer if they take more money from those who produce to give it to those who do not.

Legitimising the populist message is not the way to combat radicalism. It fuels populism.

Daniel Lacalle is a PhD in Economics, fund manager and author of Escape from the Central Bank Trap (BEP), Life In The Financial Markets, and The Energy World Is Flat (Wiley).

Video and Images courtesy CNBC

 

Video: Expectations of Second Quarter Growth Positive

Global Economy, Interviews, Media, On the cover, Sin categoría

In this video, we comment on the prospect of growth and inflation in developed markets. While inflation expectations were too aggressive at the beginning of the year, I remain positive on US growth and EU.

 

Daniel Lacalle is Chief Economist at Tressis, PhD in Economics, Fund Manager at Adriza International  Opportunities and author of “Escape from the Central Bank Trap”, “Life In The Financial Markets” and “The Energy World Is Flat”.

Unsustainable? Welfare, Taxation and Bureaucracy

Global Economy, On the cover, Sin categoría

Angela Merkel used to say that “the European Union is c5% of the world’s population, c25% of its GDP and c50% of global welfare spending”:

The real data is more concerning.

The European Union is:

7.2% of the World Population.
23.8% of the World’s GDP.
58% of the World’s Welfare Spending.

Something has to give.

The EU average tax burden on workers is 44.9%. The average worker in the EU spends half a year working for the tax man.

Taxation accounts for 41% of the euro area GDP.

Ease of doing business remains below the leading economies of the world.

Bureaucracy is asphyxiating. The EU approves on average 80 directives, 1200 regulations and 700 decisions per year.

The main EU economies remain significantly below the leaders in economic freedom.

At the same time, despite massive tax burden and constant confiscation of wealth, the EU’s average debt to GDP is 90%. Continuously making science fiction estimates of tax evasion and calling to tax the rich as a mirage, has led to unsustainable levels of government burden on the real economy and hinders investment and capital investment as policies are increasingly aimed at taxing the productive to subsidize the unproductive.

Using unrealistic estimates of tax revenues made by politicians -that are always missed- for very real expenditures -which are consistently above budget- has made the EU miss its debt reduction expectations.

The cost of hiper-regulation and excessive taxes to job creation, investment and innovation are evident. The EU has an unemployment rate that almost doubles the leading economic peers, and taxation hinders the growth of SMEs (small and medium enterprises), which shows a ratio of development to large companies that is half the same ratio in the US.

The EU has many positive things, as I explained here. But we cannot let bureaucracy and confiscatory taxation to take over a worthy project. Because ignoring those risks, we would make the EU implode.

Unless the EU politicians change their mindset of a model built on massive taxation and bureaucracy and start putting at the forefront of policy cutting taxes, slashing red tape, more open business, more economic freedom, focusing on job creation and attraction of capital, the welfare state will implode.

The EU’s welfare state can only be protected defending growth, investment, and job creation. However, it will likely be destroyed by the same ones that say they defend “the public sector”. By making it unsustainable.

Daniel Lacalle is Chief Economist at Tressis SV, has a PhD in Economics and is author of “Escape from the Central Bank Trap”, “Life In The Financial Markets” and “The Energy World Is Flat” (Wiley)

Images courtesy Lisa, 2012 at Washington Post Writers Group

(Data Eurostat, World Bank, Daily Telegraph)

Why is productivity growth so low? (Focus Economics)

Global Economy, On the cover, Sin categoría

Please read the entire article here.  Focus Economics analyses the weak productivity growth in most OECD countries.

23 economic experts weigh in: Why is productivity growth so low?

The OECD has written extensively on the subject of productivity growth observing that productivity is pro-cyclical, meaning that in times of recession productivity tends to fall and in times of economic growth, productivity tends to increase. Therefore, looking at producitvity growth in the shorter-term, such as quarterly or annually, can be misleading, as it is often extremely volatile. Most strong quarters or years of economic growth will show strong gains in productivity and vice versa. Looking at multi-year longer-term productivity growth, however, is more useful. For example, producivity growth has been low in the U.S. for the last 5 years, even as the economy has emerged from the financial crisis, which raises a lot of red flags.

Indeed, U.S. manufacturing sector productivity increased 0.5% over the last five years from 2011 to 2016, which the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics notes is “well below the growth rate of 3.2 percent from 1987 to 2016.”

This is not exclusive to the U.S., as productivity growth has generally been low going back to the financial crisis for most developed countries. However, the drop in productivity has been going on for decades, all the way back to the 1970s in some cases

My opinion:

“The decline in productivity, in my opinion, is the result of a combination of factors:

– Perpetuating overcapacity through cheap debt and excess liquidity.
– Large increase in subsidies to obsolete or low productivity sectors (particularly so-called national champions) including currency devaluations that are indirect subsidies to rent-seekers and crony sectors.
– Large increase in government spending aimed at financing areas with no real economic return and white elephants.

These factors make capital allocation go to low productivity sectors because incentives are provided through fiscal and monetary policy. Financial repression incentivises low productivity subsidizing it.”

All text and graph courtesy of Focus Economics @focuseconomics