The European Commission will want to increase the membership fees from the countries belonging to the European Union. This was announced by the Vice-President of the Commission responsible for economic affairs, Valdis Dombrovskis.
The EU budget needs to be replenished, as many of its reserves have already been used up in the first years – said Dombrovskis, referring to the EU financial perspective 2021-27. He spoke Wednesday at the Bloomberg conference. The agency writesthat it indicated that a good moment to make a decision on additional EU contributions would be a review of the implementation of the long-term budget, which is planned for mid-year.
The European Union is faced with the prospect of large unplanned expenditures related to two issues. Firstly, it is financial support for Ukraine during the war, and then participation in its reconstruction. Secondly, it is a support plan for European businesses, similar to the one that cost over $ 300 billion. introduced in the United States.
The Americans have adopted a set of incentives, which, among other things, is to encourage global companies to move their production to the US. In this situation, the Union, in order not to lose its competitiveness, must respond with a similar programme, but it must somehow finance it. So far, there has been an idea to issue common EU debt for this purpose, but there is a fear that some EU countries will not agree to it. This, for example, is not supported by the German government.
An alternative to borrowing this money is to collect it from Member States in the form of additional contributions. Dombrovskis did not specify whether he meant to increase the level of their contributions on a permanent basis, or whether they would be one-off, additional transfers from European capitals to the EU budget.
See also: Poland among the inflation leaders in Europe. The closer to war the worse it gets
2. Concerns about job loss are growing, hopes for an increase in earnings are diminishing
The mood on the Polish labor market is deteriorating more and more clearly, which can be interpreted as a positive phenomenon in the context of combating inflation. From the report “Labor market, education, competences. Current trends and research results” prepared by Gi Group for the Polish Agency for Enterprise Development shows that the conditions conducive to the emergence of wage pressure in companies are disappearing.
Primarily fewer and fewer employees say they expect a salary increase. A year ago, in January, there were 54.5% of them, now (i.e. in November, because then the research was carried out) there are only 35% of them, with wage increases expected primarily by people aged 18-24, i.e. those who actually earning the least on average, because they are at the very beginning of their professional career. At the same time with 2.9 percent. up to 14 percent the percentage of people who are afraid that their salary will decrease has increased.
The percentage of people who are afraid of losing their jobs has increased from 27.7% to 27.7%. a year ago to 42 percent. now. The report also mentions that 76% of of people dissatisfied with their workplace actively browses new job advertisements, and therefore prepares to change it. All this means that the position of entrepreneurs on the labor market should improve: since people start looking for a new job to a greater extent, they will not need to be additionally encouraged to do so by offering a salary increase, and on the other hand, employees fearing that they will be made redundant. , usually do not have much determination to fight for a salary increase in the place where they are employed. Across the economy, lower wage growth should help to reduce inflation.
3. USA: inflation is falling, industrial production and retail sales are too
We have another data confirming a rapid drop in inflation in the United States. The PPI index for producer prices fell by 0.5 percent in December compared to November, and it was expected to fall by only 0.1 percent. Year on year, we have a decrease from 7.3 percent. up to 6.2 percent, i.e. up to the lowest level since April 2021. The core PPI is also down, from 6.2% to 6.2%. up to 5.5 percent Here, too, the data is better than expected.
The fact that the demand in the US market is declining, which should also help to reduce inflation, is confirmed by the data on retail sales. It fell by 1.1% in December. compared to November. A decline of 0.9% was expected. Excluding fuel and cars, sales of all other goods and services fell by 0.7%, and were expected to remain flat.
Also published industrial production data and they look bad too. It fell in December by 0.7 percent, which is also more than expected, compared to November. On an annual basis, production in December was only 1.6 percent higher than in December. higher than in December 2021 – this is the weakest increase since March 2021. Utilization of production capacity in American factories decreased from 79.4 percent to 79.4 percent. to 78.8 percent
All these data suggest that demand in the US economy is declining, which may encourage the Fed to slow down the pace of interest rate hikes. Therefore, the financial market initially reacted positively to them. Then, however, the market sentiment was spoiled by the head of the Fed branch in St. Louis James Bullard, saying that Fed policy is not yet restrictive enough and inflation will not fall as fast as financial markets expect. As a result, US stock markets ended the day with clear declines yesterday.
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4. The government already has a draft law on limiting wholesale purchases of apartments
Bill restrictive the possibility of buying flats wholesale is already available in the Chancellery of the Prime Minister. The restrictions are to apply to entities with at least five apartments; in accordance with the proposed regulation, they could buy in the future one flat once every 12 months, paying the tax on civil law transactions at the level of 6%. property values.
New recipes will not apply but single-family homes. They will also not apply in the case of inheritance of a flat, donation, court judgment, reverse mortgage or life annuity.
The new regulations are about reducing the demand for apartments from funds making wholesale purchases of real estate, which then earn on them by renting them or simply waiting for their value to increase and then selling them at a profit. Limiting the functioning of such funds on the market should result in housing prices growing more slowly or not at all, which in turn will make them more easily available to other, “ordinary” buyers.
See also: The fight against inflation will be long and hard. Don’t be fooled by the falling main indicator
5. PGNiG lowers gas prices for business by 19 percent.
PGNiG introduces a reduction in gas prices for business customers. Prices will drop by 19%.
The discount applies small and medium enterprises using the “Gas for business” offer. PGNiG remembers in your communicationthat there are several hundred thousand of them. The change came into force yesterday and will apply until the end of the winter season, i.e. until the end of March. PGNiG could change prices for companies on its own overnight, because in this market new tariffs do not have to be approved by the Energy Regulatory Office, as it is done in the case of gas for households.
PGNiG explains that it lowered prices because they also fell on wholesale markets. On the Polish Power Exchange, a gas contract with delivery in the second quarter costs about PLN 300 per megawatt hour today. In November and early December, it was above PLN 600 per MWh. In this context, a price reduction of only 19 percent. may be disappointing, but PGNiG explains that when prices on the markets rose sharply a year ago, it did not pass on the entire price increase to customers, but only part of it. Thus, in the case of end consumers, both upward and downward price changes are smaller than changes in the much more volatile wholesale market.
