NIS 80 billion is not a plan. That’s a lot of PR

Most of the criticism focused on the GDP as a big package in international comparison – less than 6%. But in fact, the full amount won’t even get there, at least for now. Looking at the various government spending so far, some might say, Because it is hard to criticize the fact that the money is not yet out at this point in time.

For example, Social Security payments for April have not yet been paid, the second beating of the grants for self-employed, the more generous, which should come only next month or leverage funds that should help leveraged companies down the road.

In fact, even now the picture is incomplete, partly for the same reasons that NIS 80 billion is not really NIS 80 billion. There are many sums thrown into the air space but there is really no idea what the government ministers are about how much they are and whether they will ever reach their quota. The most notable of which is the rejection of VAT payments, Social Security, electricity and water. The Finance Ministry assumed it was NIS 9 billion. However, rejections, apart from Social Security, were given to those who asked only and not overwhelmingly.

The deferral of VAT was NIS 800 million and Social Security estimates that their rejections will be less than NIS 1.6 billion. As a large part of the payments that were supposed to be deferred were canceled as soon as employers sent their employees on free leave. Deferred to light so that the period has not ended, and as far as water payments are concerned, there is currently no orderly concentration of the data.

The reimbursement of the down payment for the corporate tax that the tax authority eventually offered was also partial. Since companies were careful to ask for the advances back. For if, in the end, the application was unwarranted, and the companies had to pay tax at a similar rate to the down payment, they could have paid interest and fines, according to several accountants. So in the end, if the Ministry of Finance estimated that the repayments would actually amount to NIS 3 billion, they were only NIS 1.5 billion.

The more critical sections of the aid package are not the ones in which the Treasury has rounded up the numbers, but rather the ones where the numbers are clear, but the execution rate is not fast enough. The most prominent of them – the loan funds. The frequent changes made by the Accountant General to the Small Business Loan Fund with a turnover of up to NIS 400 million – made it difficult for the Fund to start and distribute loans. To the credit of Accountant General Roni Hezekiah it will be said that in the end these changes were the result of the ongoing discourse with the banks and the public audit.

Currently, out of NIS 8 billion, loans totaling NIS 2.5 billion have been distributed. After birth ropes that have taken too long, the expectation is that the next two weeks will see a rise in lending.

Alongside this, the large business fund with a turnover of over NIS 200 million has not yet started distributing loans. While these are businesses with deeper pockets than small businesses, they have also been hit by an unparalleled crisis. It has been over a month since they realized the size of the event in Israel, and only this week the budget allowing the guarantee for the same fund has been approved, after only the criteria for eligibility for the loan were set last weekend.

Alongside these are some moves that have been declared in the Treasury, and are an integral part of helping the economy, but nothing has really happened with them other than press releases. For example, business adjustments to the requirements of the Ministry of Health and assistance to the Ministry of Economy in the amount of NIS 700 million or assistance to the third sector in the amount of NIS 200 million. Those plans didn’t even start moving.

The real problem is in the blank sections – where no agreements can be reached. Netanyahu’s indecisiveness, Kahlon’s loss of interest and Netanyahu’s attempt to avoid any kind of criticism in the meantime are frightening the system when it comes to grants for businesses that should amount to NIS 5.2 billion.

At this stage, the Treasury is talking about grants of up to NIS 350,000 for businesses with turnover of up to NIS 20 million. When the extent of the injury will determine the extent of compensation. With a minimum injury threshold of 25%. While business requires compensation for every returning employee, at this point this is not really at stake. However, according to factors involved in the subject each day, the amounts and conditions vary.

Of course, all these steps are being taken to accelerate the economy, which may already be appropriate to begin with. The Treasury is afraid to empty the cartridge already, even if no one is really clear how long the crisis will last. And it is also unclear whether the relief to the economy that began will continue in two or three weeks. It may be in light of the composition of the government that, at least according to the coalition agreement, does not place any budgetary brakes on it – the concern of the professional echelons has only increased.

The direct budget portion of the aid package – NIS 11 billion is not, of course, supposed to go out all at once. So far, according to information obtained by Calcalist, NIS 4.2 billion has been spent in the Ministry of Health, most of which for medical equipment purchases through the Ministry of Defense. The government ministries were unable to respond to “Calcalist” how they distributed a billion shekels aimed at reducing exposure to at-risk populations. Of this amount, just over half should go to the fathers and mothers protective program – the residents of the third age institutions. The name of Prof. Ronnie Gamzo, who probably knows the public system, spelled out exactly how much money he needed and how much he had spent so far – about half the amount. The rest of the amount that is supposed to come through welfare, health or directly from the treasury is another fog.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Transport has accelerated infrastructure work with a total budget of NIS 1.1 billion to promote the highway project by Ayalon routes, the promotion of railway electrification by Israel Railways and the upgrading of intercity roads and the addition of public transport routes by the Israeli routes. All projects are currently in progress. Payment for the projects will be finalized.

All of this allows the government to decide, among other things, unsupervised that it continues to distribute food boxes to ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods even after the closure has been lifted, with no one clear about what the budget is and at what other population it comes from. Just as the regulations that are supposed to regulate the economy’s activities, so does the aid package, the more transparent and clear the better the public.