Europe is imposing significant savings on our country: at least 23 billion euros over 4 or 7 years

by atrocious_cleva82

9 comments

  2. Knowing austerities can lead to excess deaths (330000 excess deaths in UK for instance during times of cut spending) due to deterioriation of mental health, suicidality (especially among the breadwinners aka young men), cut spending on health etc, I feel we will go straight to a path of radicalized population. Whether it be left, right, islamic radicalization. Especially with AI and social media.

    Knowing Elon recently received stock bonus worth of 56 billion dollars. It is just mindblowing that some people have to die for savings, while others receive twice the amount Belgium has to save.

  4. I think that it’s fair that Belgium should get its budget in order. Europe needs to have the capacity to invest in projects that will lead to GDP growth. Individual members that already borrow extensively only to fund non value-adding activities (pensions, healthcare) will hamper the long term growth of our continent.

    We also need to be able to face the next big crisis and with the way Belgian debt is spiralling, we might not be able to do so at reasonable borrowing rates.

    Now that Belgium has parties from the right in power (or will soon) at every level of the country, let’s see what they really achieve rather than just put the blame on the PS. I think the next few years are a time of great opportunities for the country. I’m less hopeful for the rest of Europe though.

  5. Ouch. Guess you can’t import a lot of people and then put them on benefits to lie about GDP growth for this one.

  6. We knew this was coming. How many times has De Wever mentioned this the past months before the elections? It’s like the NVA is the only party who even cares, or pretended to care. It’s probably one of the main reasons they had such a successful campaign.

    Meanwhile the other parties are seemingly living in some fantasy land where they can keep increasing the deficit.

  7. We don’t have to save 23 billion though, we can also generate extra income to cover parts of the gap…

  8. >The European Commission has provided the Belgian government with clarity about the steps we must take to comply with European budgetary rules. We can choose between 2 processes to get our budget back in order: one of 4 years or one of 7 years. **In total we need to save at least 23 billion euros.**

    The European Commission’s communication is the result of new budgetary rules. At 4.4 percent of GDP, **our budget deficit is larger than the permitted 3 percent. Our debt ratio is also too high: 105.2 percent instead of the European maximum of 60 percent.**

    Dear VRT, this headline about “significant imposed savings” is a bit misleading, because it is making people to believe that Belgium is forced by the EU to start important savings (cuts in public expenses), which is false.

    Cuts in social expenses is only a way to reduce the debt or deficit, and it is the typical right wing/liberal solution.

    But there are other options: for instance, the government could increase taxes to big corporations or super rich people in order to reduce the deficit.

    My main remark here is not about what is the best option to reduce the deficit, or even if the deficit is such a “worrying” aspect. My point is that public media should be more objective and inform about the reality without falling in the right wing biased economical opinions.

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