And the budget was equated to a bayonet – Newspaper Kommersant No. 168 (7369) of 09/13/2022

On September 12, Russian President Vladimir Putin held a video conference meeting on economic issues, at which the principles of budget projections for three years were to be finally approved. Special Correspondent “Kommersant” Andrey Kolesnikov, noting that the government intends to form a development budget in the current circumstances, draws attention to the nuances.

Starting the meeting, Vladimir Putin invited his colleagues to discuss “today the current situation in the Russian economy, forecasts for its development.” But at the same time, he immediately discussed it, one can directly say, with himself. After that, discussing it with someone else did not make any sense at all.

“I want to emphasize again that Russia is confidently coping with external pressure, and in fact, one might say, with financial and technological aggression from some countries,” the president explained. This is already obvious to everyone, and to them too.

No, it’s not obvious to them. If it were obvious, the attacks would not continue. And they are getting stronger.

“We promptly implemented effective protective measures, launched mechanisms to support key industries, strategic enterprises, as well as small and medium-sized businesses,” Mr. Putin added. “All of them are aimed at maintaining employment and jobs, at providing targeted assistance to our citizens, and before all families with children, pensioners. As a result of the implementation of this set of measures, we prevented a sharp decline in the economy. Inflation was also quickly stabilized. After peaking at 17.8% in April, it has dropped to 14.1% today, on September 5th. There is every reason to expect inflation to be around 12% by the end of the year. And, as you say yourself, we are constantly discussing this, our experts in the administration, in the government believe that the downward trend in inflation will continue.

At least at the Eastern Economic Forum, several members of the government at once, one way or another responsible for the economy, actually claimed that 10% inflation by the end of the year is a real figure. It looks like they agreed that the number would be just that.

— The monthly dynamics of key indicators also indicates that the economy is gradually stabilizing, leveling off, and entering the growth trajectory. Enterprises are returning to a normal rhythm of work,” Mr. Putin looked or wanted to look as optimistic as possible. In construction, growth was noted at all: in July, the increase was 6.6%. In general, the decline in GDP in July slowed down to 4.3%. Let me remind you that a month earlier it was estimated at 4.9%.

If you decide that statistics will not lie (and when did it happen?), then the situation looks like the light of a kerosene lamp at the end of the tunnel of an elementary particle accelerator. That is, at least alive.

“It is indicative,” continued the Russian president, “that in August lending to the economy, the real sector and the population by banks also revived. This, of course, is a good sign that economic activity is on the rise. I consider the overall stable situation in the labor market to be a very important, significant achievement of the government. Even more than stable: the unemployment rate is at historical lows – in May-July it was only 3.9%.

It seems impossible to explain this with reasonable arguments, except for “yes, it was the same with unemployment before.”

However, Vladimir Putin could not bring himself to talk for a long time exclusively about economic indicators:

– We see that the actions of our, to put it mildly, ill-wishers are largely unpredictable and impulsive lately. They are clearly unprofessional, and therefore impulsive, which means that the more we must work in our own logic, keep the initiative. Not just react to some unfriendly steps, but consistently solve our development tasks – in the economy, social sphere, infrastructure. This fully applies to the preparation of the draft federal budget.

To begin with, a significant part of the income from the sale of oil and oil products will have to be deleted from it. Moreover, the Russian president promised Western countries that if they install ceiling for the sale of Russian oil (and they will establish), then Russia, of course, will not sell oil to them at all.

Mr. Putin, meanwhile, encouraged himself and his colleagues:

— I have already said that the rapid adoption of large-scale anti-crisis measures, the stability achieved, the strength of the Russian economy in the face of external challenges is largely the result of our responsible macroeconomic policy in previous years!

Well, it’s not a sin to repeat to colleagues out loud again.

– Therefore, the state of the Russian budget is now also significantly better than in the economies of most of the G20 countries, and even among our friends in the BRICS countries! – Mr. Putin could not resist the BRICS. – For example, in August, after a relatively weak second quarter, which was caused by objective factors, there was a recovery in the volume of VAT and collections of other turnover taxes.

It seems that the economy has not felt as good for a long time as during a special military operation.

“Today, as I already said, we must discuss in detail the budget projections for the next three years,” Vladimir Putin finished. to save money and create a “safety cushion”, how to create it in the new conditions and what is a “safety cushion” in modern conditions, when we have a well-known and inevitable process of de-dollarization. In general, let’s get back to all these topics that we practically and so discuss practically every day in working mode. But now the time has come when we must collect all this together and move on to preparing for the adoption of final decisions related to the budget process.

That is, we should expect a confident development budget for the next three years, which even looks defiant in such a situation.

Well, the inhabitants of the Kharkiv region, who received Russian passports and screwed Russian numbers on their cars, were also told that “Russia has come forever.”