EU Member States must ensure that the fight against inflation continues at a time of great economic uncertainty, the European Commission emphasizes in its recommendations in the context of the European Semester.

At the same time, the Commission states that Greece meets the EU criteria. regarding debt and deficit. In particular, the report states that Greece is not among the countries that do not meet the deficit criterion, such as Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Estonia, Spain, France, Italy, Latvia, Hungary, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia. and France, Italy and Finland do not meet debt criteria.

In its recommendations, the Commission points out that Greece and Italy continue to record fiscal imbalances, but their weaknesses are showing signs of diminishing due to policy progress.

General recommendations – Removal of energy measures

As Europe moves out of the general exemption clause, the Commission is once again providing quantitative and differentiated country-specific fiscal policy advice. The general recommendations of the European Commission are as follows:

• Member States that have met their medium-term fiscal target (the budget target set for each country under the Stability and Growth Pact) based on the 2023 Spring Outlook should remain financially sound in 2024.
• All other Member States are encouraged to ensure prudent fiscal policy, in particular by limiting the nominal increase in nationally financed net primary spending in 2024.
• All Member States should support public investments financed from the national budget and ensure the efficient use of grants from the Recovery Fund and other EU funds, especially to promote the transition to green and digital technologies.
• All Member States are required to remove existing energy support measures by the end of 2023. If a new increase in energy prices is recorded that requires the implementation of support measures, they should be aimed at protecting vulnerable households and businesses, be financially acceptable and support incentives. to save energy.
• Beyond 2024, Member States must continue to pursue a medium-term fiscal strategy of gradual and sustained tightening, coupled with investments and reforms that promote higher sustainable growth, to achieve a prudent medium-term fiscal position.

As K wrote today, the purpose of the commission is to help the European Central Bank fight inflation, which means that high fuel prices should not be neutralized by government intervention, because in this way consumers are not motivated to save. energy .

According to Brussels, only income-based support, not horizontal support, can be justified, and then only if prices rise again. Notably, Greece was the country with the third largest energy precision support last year, spending 2.3% of GDP horizontally, compared to only about 0.4% of GDP that would be required to support vulnerable populations.