Economy: and then the government would hide behind the traditional family model and take public money

On Monday morning, Viktor Orbán announced stricter epidemiological restrictions, culminating in a curfew between 8 p.m. and 5 a.m., with the exception of workers and, of course, dog walkers.

The prime minister acknowledged that the package he has just announced for the economy is not long-term aid, he has only promised an action plan that “will help everyone.” Stores should now close at 7pm with a few exceptions. Restaurants must close for at least 30 days, and no employee contributions must be paid until then. Hotels can only accept arrivals for work, 80 percent of reservations for the next 30 days will be reimbursed by the state if no one is fired. Advocacy organizations say this hardly helps hotels and pubs, and restaurants, perhaps, in commerce, are just happy to have at least one unique set of rules. Part of the footballers’ salaries will also be assumed by the government, and the moratorium on the repayment of student loans has been extended for half a year.

Finally, the prime minister also announced this Friday that the VAT on takeout food will be reduced from 27 to 5 percent, which is a great help for companies in the sector.

Viktor Orbán has repeatedly said that Austria is our “laboratory”, that is, the developments and measures that are followed here; this is of course propaganda, we would actually be happy if there were only 30-40 deaths per day here than in Austria. However, most of the decisions now announced follow the Austrian path, with a significant slippage. And the western neighbor went even further: on Friday it was announced that Austrian schools and shopping centers would be closed.

The government also presented a plan for the ninth amendment to the basic granite resistance law. By including the “mother woman, father man” clause in the constitution, they have tried to confront everyone with institutionalized homophobia, even though there is a lot of money involved in the amendment.

The text states that “public money is the income, expenditure and right of the State.” Until now this has not been defined as such, it is not surprising that in other rules of our legal system the details are later rewritten in such a way that, for example, the assets of the tao currency or the foundations of the central bank do not count as public money. The constitutional amendment also requires parliament to enact a two-thirds law on trusts. Many public funds have already been channeled to foundations managed by the NER, so this system would be implemented in the event of a change of government.

Compared to the same period in the previous year, Hungarian GDP fell 4.7 percent in the third quarter, but compared to the previous quarter, the growth was 11.3 percent, the CSO announced. In other words, between July and September, the economy recovered rapidly before the second wave of the epidemic arrived here.

From the figures released so far, it appears that the recovery in the services sector was the fastest, and this sector may suffer as a result of further closures later in the year. The industry is back to 99.5 percent of the level of the last month before the crisis, and as many factories were prepared for epidemic severity in the spring, there is a possibility that there will be a minor decline by year-end.

Image of the week: armed men guard the evening curfew in Budapest.

The deal between the EU Member States and the European Parliament has been completed. Last week, the delegations of the EU institutions agreed on the conditions of the rule of law and now the budget issues. Slowly, the question really remains whether Viktor Orbán will torpedo everything.

If the Hungarian Parliament does not vote for the EU to obtain a loan to finance the recovery fund, it will be impossible to activate the 750 billion euro package to offset the damage caused by the epidemic. However, Viktor Orbán raised this possibility due to the conditions of the rule of law. EU leaders have already indicated that blackmail cannot achieve results, especially since Hungary is interested in having an EU budget. Soon after, the Polish Prime Minister also announced his willingness to veto the EU budget.

Meanwhile, a debate was held in the European Parliament on “the agreement on the financing of the Union and the conditionality of payments”. Hungary immediately recalled about a third of the sixty respondents about the rule of law.

The collection of the business tax should be suspended, as László Parragh, president of the Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, suggested to Viktor Orbán. As this is the largest source of revenue for local governments, it is no wonder that city leaders have been unanimously outraged, even right-wing mayors have pointed out that the idea is bad.

Mayor Gergely Karácsony was the longest: he said that if the plan was implemented, public transport in Budapest would stop the next day. And János Palotás – who says that the idea indicates an astonishing dilettantism – drew attention to another aspect: how the business tax is paid by companies after sales income, which company has stopped, the plan would not help.

With the exception of Donald Trump, the entire world is preparing for Joe Biden to be president of the United States as of January 20 next year. Biden’s staff have already come up with a handover plan, which, of course, wouldn’t hurt if the other party had the receptivity to do so. Meanwhile, they have announced the priorities and concrete steps that the future president will take to begin his work.

The main aspect is the management of the epidemic, the epidemiological authority will be instructed to develop a detailed set of rules on the situation in which closures can be ordered and reopened. They also give money to make vaccines and masks. Meanwhile, the economy is not incidental, either: Small businesses would be supported with a reset package, an unemployment insurance plan that would be expanded much more than usual, and many unemployed would be hired as public employees in healthcare. But action against racism and a state program to support environmental awareness are also among the promises. In which, then, according to the paper form, Republicans in the Senate will have a majority in the Senate, according to the paper form.

But Europe is also preparing for the Biden government to take office. There may be negotiations instead of a trade war, but the new president will not be an easy negotiating partner, either. It does not want to side with either party in the EU-Britain debate, but cooperation in NATO could be better if Europe so wishes.

The Hungarian team reached the European Football Championship postponed until 2021 due to the epidemic. This time, however, we will not only be participants in the European Championship, but also co-organizers with 11 other countries. We analyze what all this could mean for the economy: the average foreigner spent 7.9 days at the last European Championship, spending € 154 a day. This time, due to the sheer number of venues, only French and Portuguese fans will be allowed to pass, but the Hungarian spending will certainly boost the economy in that short time.

Of course, this is the optimistic scenario, assuming there will be an Eb, taking place here, and fans will be admitted as well. The epidemic could still rewrite everything, big changes could come until next June, but at the time of our winning goal, we had a much better job to think about it.