The government has made the vaccine contracts public; submitted a bill for a youth tax credit; Tighter but still permissive closures began, and many looked for loopholes. This is the weekly economic summary from hvg.hu.

New epidemiological austerity measures went into effect Monday at midnight, including locking a store, but before that, people quickly broke into stores over the weekend, so that grocery stores would open Monday for the morning, exactly as it was, as they only sold -essential products. They had to be closed. So she could see crowd scenes in many places that went to her. At the beginning of the week, some stores allowed to pick up the products ordered from their webshop via the Internet in person at the gate and parking lot of the store that would otherwise be closed.

Last weekend, the Ikeas rushed to buy blue bags and batteries, for example. And in stores that can remain open, what we saw last year is also repeated: in hypermarkets, 50 to 100 percent more toilet paper, tissues and paper towels are sold than before the government announced a epidemiological hardening. And there were so many on Lake Venice last weekend that now they were asking the buffets not to open. The then Minister of Agriculture, István Nagy, announced that although the florists had to close, the flower stalls in the market could still be open.

For the duration of the current shutdown, it will reduce expected economic growth by 0.1 percent per week, Gergely Gulyás reported. We asked economists who said this was a fairly realistic estimate.

In the middle of the week it was reported that neither of the ministries was willing to publicize their contracts for the purchase of Russian and Chinese vaccines to the media or opposition parliamentarians. After many of us wrote this, the government promised to make the vaccine contracts public and chose a not-so-official way to do it: Gergely Gulyás posted on Facebook.

It turned out that the state purchases Chinese vaccines from a Hungarian pharmaceutical company for € 31 per piece, and 3.5 million of the 5 million doses will be enough to deliver here in the summer. The Russian vaccine was purchased from a Russian company for $ 19.9.

The sales contract has been signed, so that as soon as the competition office establishes the agreement, Opus Global, part of the Mészáros Group, will acquire Tigáz. Half of the country’s largest natural gas distributor through gas pipelines has been owned by Mészáros since 2019.

Tigáz’s ownership change does not affect retail clients, as state-owned MVM Next (formerly NKM Energia) is the service provider in the area. Distributors cannot produce or trade energy. All this means that in the future the state MVM will use the Lőrinc Mészáros network to supply the population.

Following approval by the Hungarian Competition Authority, the transaction is expected to close on March 31, after which the company will continue under the name Opus Tigáz Gázhálózati Zrt.

Image of the week: Radetzky’s barracks disappeared.

A year ago, the government declared a state of emergency. For the anniversary, we have compiled ten records and lows that show the great fluctuations that have occurred in our economy. The drop in GDP in the second quarter of last year, for example, was the biggest drop since this figure was measured, and then when full open came, there was the biggest quarterly growth in history. It was also an unimaginable number in the past that measured a 93-97 percent decrease in tourism on an annual basis for several months.

Grocery stores and pharmacies jumped the most, though when after school closed and the first round of the home office, many found they had to spend on home computer items as soon as the stores opened. , we saw a 15.7 percent increase there. as well. The prices of oil, jewelry and fruit were the ones that rose the most, while textbooks, parking and potatoes were the three items that fell the most.

A bill on a youth tax credit has been introduced. Starting in 2022, the part of the salary of all employees under the age of 25 below the average earnings will be free of PIT, above which the personal income tax will have to be paid, quite accurately in comparison with average earnings in July of the previous year. . Those who earn more are in a better situation: those who earn minimum wage, for example, can only count on a discount of 25,500 HUF, and those who earn more earn up to 60-70 thousand.

This also means that young people will receive a shocking gift for turning 25, because at that time their entitlement will end and their net salary will decrease by up to 60-70 thousand florins.

Once again, government representatives and city leaders at the county level agreed to compensate for the loss of tax revenue. In the series of negotiations so far, Érd is the first city in which government representatives have not possibly refused to give money to operate. As before, it was said again that mayors would propose the transfer of public tasks to the State, citing public catering as an example.

The government even recommended that Szentendre apply for a loan to solve his financial problems. The authorities made it clear that this could be compensation for the local business tax, but there is no way to make up for the loss of revenue due to other government decisions. This week a bill was also presented, according to which the annual contribution of 5,000 forint to the chamber must be paid in the future to the national chamber of commerce and not to the regional one to develop the places that currently do not have sufficient funds.

The difference between the living standards of Hungarian men and women is large, but at least it is steadily decreasing, until a crisis hits, the situation of women will be much worse. We got to this in our Women’s Day compilation, in which we presented statistics on gender differences. Women’s wages have not reached 90 percent of men’s wages, even in the best of times; The figures clearly show that the principle of equal pay for equal work alone is not enough, the problem is that in many places it is more difficult for women to get into well-paid positions. And women’s jobs are less resilient to the crisis: despite growth in both genders so far, in the 2020 crisis, employment fell by an average of 37,000 a year compared to 2019, with men falling by 3,000. and women in 34,000.

Raising just one child poses a serious risk of poverty, and at the time of the last census, 464,000 of the 533,000 single parents were women. In all Hungarian households, the per capita income was HUF 167 thousand per month in 2019, while in the place where the father raised his children alone, it was barely 119 thousand.



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