(Finance) – The Def forecasts GDP growth of 1% for 2024. A slowdown compared to the previous year, but decidedly positive considering the international situation. If optimism prevails for the current year, the prospects for 2025 are instead dominated by uncertainty” and “without the cut in the tax wedge we would lose around 5.5 billion euros of consumption at constant prices, with growth in household spending which would slow down from +0.7% to +0.2%”. Thus Confessors on the occasion of the hearing on the Def. “Therefore, the possibility of maintaining or not in the next few years the measures introduced in the last budget law for 2024 only is worrying: the cut in the wedge alone is worth around 11 billion”, he underlines.
Among the interventions deemed essential, Confesercenti it also indicates the need to counteract the decline in self-employment: “Since 2004, approximately 1.3 million fewer units, 20%, while employees have increased by approximately 2.5 million units, 15.2% in more. We need to support small entrepreneurs in a long and complex transition process to be able to withstand the challenges and remain on the market in a non-marginal way”. And to “invest in tourism, fundamental for the growth of the entire Italian economy: it must be considered a strategic sector, at the center of the political and economic agenda”.
To achieve GDP growth of around 1%, as estimated by the government, Two conditions are necessary: “relaunch of consumption – particularly fragile starting from the last quarter of last year – and compensation for the fall in investments in the construction sector with increases in other types of productive investment, especially thanks to the push deriving from the implementation of the Pnrr”. He stated it Giovanni Da Pozzo, Vice President of Confcommercio-Imprese for Italy, in the hearing on the Def in the Budget Committees of the House and Senate. For 2024, according to Confcommercio “the evolution path of the gross product, in the first months of the current year, does not outline a safe trajectory”. As far as consumption is concerned, the role of internal tourist demand will be fundamental.” “In 2025 – continued Da Pozzo – the finding of resources for the refinancing of the support, decontribution and tax reduction measures in place this year would be achieved according to the Def through additional revenues generated in the space ranging from the fight against tax evasion and avoidance to the greater revenue deriving from the improvement of compliance. It is a crucial point, because it must be noted that the public debt cannot be further burdened by unexpected charges resulting from even modest errors in the current management of revenues and expenses”
In 2024 and 2025 the expected rate cut and the implementation of the Pnrr will be “two powerful stimuli to Italian growth” after the GDP “surprised positively in 2023, reaching +0.9% per year”, he underlines Confindustria in the hearing at the House and Senate Budget Committees on the Def. “However, there are various factors that will tend to slow down Italian GDP in the two-year period” notes Confindustria, specifying however that “the net effect is expected to be positive”. This concerns in particular the “cost of electricity paid by companies” which “remains higher in Italy than in the main EU countries and also compared to other major international competitors, such as the USA and Japan” and the “global bottlenecks in transport”. Added to these two elements is “the gradual exit from the Superbonus, already expiring at the end of 2023 in terms of the 110% rate, and other construction incentives”. In light of all these factors, Confindustria recalls, the CSC “estimated a growth of the Italian economy substantially in line with that indicated in the DEF: +0.9% in 2024 and +1.1% in 2025”
The decline in the deficit will be “substantial” this year in line with government estimates while the debt trend will be “less in line” with the forecasts of the Economic and Financial Document. “The reduction of the deficit will be significant in 2024, reaching 4.4% of GDP (from 7.4% in 2023), slower in 2025, at 3.9%. This is thanks to a positive revenue dynamic and limited expenditure ” reports Confindustria “These estimates confirm what is indicated in the public finance framework under current legislation of the DEF”. “Less in line, however, is the forecast on public debt – continues Viale dell’Astronomia – estimated by the Confindustria Study Center at 139.1% of GDP in 2024, or 1.8 points of GDP more than in 2023, and at 141 .1% in 2025 (approximately a further 2.0 points). An upward trend also confirmed by the Government which, however, estimates a significantly lower debt/GDP ratio in the DEF (at 137.8% this year and at 138). .9% next)”.
For Confindustria they need “a broader redesign” of the taxation of employee work “starting precisely from the cut in the contribution wedge” an intervention “on rates and brackets, currently limited to 2024 only” and the IRES reform “functional to make the Italian production system more competitive” must be completed.
“In a phase of weakness of the economic situation, it is necessary to boost private investments to keep businesses on the growth path“. This is what they underlined CNA, Confartigianato and Casartigiani in the hearing on the DEF daboasted to the Budget Committees of the House and Senate, judging the Government’s choice not to present the programmatic framework to Parliament as “hardly acceptable”, although motivated by the uncertainty on the application of the rules of the new European Stability Pact, as it is essential to provide to businesses and citizens, prospects and trust.
The three Confederations indicate actions and interventions to allow the country to grow. First of all, it is necessary to accelerate the Transition 5.0 program, which can count on a considerable amount of resources to accompany the production system towards the challenges of the double transition, digital and environmental, also thanks to support for energy self-production projects.
Another chapter of fundamental importance, the implementation of the Pnrr. The plan is progressing slowly, compared to the expenditure of around 80 billion expected for 2023, around half has been spent. Spending at least 20 of the 40 billion not used this year would give an important boost to the economy, especially in the area of public investments and infrastructure.
For CNA, Confartigianato and Casartigiani investment support requires refinancing the Sabatini law as soon as possible, which risks having to suspend the acceptance of applications. Furthermore, it is necessary to significantly lower the minimum investment threshold in the Single SEZ, currently set at 200 thousand euros, to accelerate spending and also allow small-sized businesses to contribute to the development of the economies of the South.
The Government will also have to adopt the national plan for progressive reductiona of the energy consumption of residential buildings foreseen by the recently approved Green Houses directive. Is there a need for a medium-term program that identifies objectives and priorities? and resources to accompany the implementation of the directive, favoring an orderly qualification of supply and demand.
Great anticipation for the issuance of the “Annual Law” dedicated to MSMEs, in which to better define tools and programmatic directions dedicated to creating the environmental and context conditions truly favorable to the birth, development and consolidation of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in the area.
Finally, the craft confederations underline the imIt is important that the EU is able to give a positive impulse to growth by thinking again (as done for Next Generation EU and SURE) to measures to support and accompany the economy that are not just made up of rules and deadlines. The objectives and deadlines linked, for example, to the so-called European Green Deal are objectively challenging, but without a common economic and fiscal policy “it will be highly unlikely to meet them”.