A recurring theme in recent years, particularly since 2006, is the growth of the debt of the federal and municipal entities, spreading the idea that it is a national problem, when the reality is that it is focused on a few entities and a few municipalities.
In itself, the debt is a good complement to budget resources, especially when it complies with what the Constitution says that it must be used for productive purposes and the procedures for its registration in the Ministry of Finance are followed and its contracting is transparent, open and the so-called PPS or APPS are included, which have come to be managed as if it is not a debt, but if it implies the use of the budget to pay for the service or as it was meant that they were payments to “corridar the contracted commitments”…
Of course, the so-called restructurings that have been a big business for those who carry them out, which in short means that their expiration is launched forward, improving the profile of the service of the same, during the efforts of the governments that contracted them, it was intense from 2007 to 2012, however, it is only a question of extending the terms for its payment.
How is the geography of inequality in our country. It is concentrated in a few entities and a minimum percentage of the almost 2,500 municipalities in the country.
The evolution of the global debt of the states is as follows: 2001, one hundred thousand million pesos; 2006, 160 billion (60%); 2012, 434 billion, 171% increase; 2018, 601 billion, 38% more; and currently it is 666 billion, this is a little over 10%.
On the other hand, 5 states concentrate 52 percent, with another 5, they are already 74%.
On the municipal side, 10 municipalities concentrate 35.9%, and with another 10, just over half. These 20 municipalities are barely 0.8%, which means in both cases that the majority have not had the credit, and none of the states and municipalities of the south-east are among the most indebted.
The municipalities that are most indebted, 86.05 percent are concentrated in only 10 states, particularly Jalisco, EDOMEX, Nuevo León, Baja California and Sonora, among others.
Hence also the dependence that both levels of government have on transfers of federal origin, when the answer has long been known: remember and take advantage of the tax powers they have, take advantage of administrative collaboration in fiscal matters and spend with order, financial discipline and with transparency and without corruption.
After the Financial Discipline Law and the current powers of the ASF, today we can control this issue both in states and municipalities, monitoring proper compliance with regulations and the use of resources, as well as taking care that states do not damage their financial balances. .
On the other hand, it has been wise not to have borrowed more at the federal level abroad, those of us who have known this issue since 1976, when an Agreement was signed with the IMF, preceded by the devaluation of the peso, by a Letter of Intent, which was revealed by a group of economist deputies, headed by the teacher Ifigenia Martínez and Armando Labra, who introduced great debates on the content of the Stabilization Agreement and in 2004 in the National Treasury Convention, the three levels of government reached agreements for a better management of the subnational debt, but the issue has been the use of its tax powers, of course there are honorable exceptions and the control of public spending.
Let’s see the current experience of Argentina, or what happened a few years ago in Greece and in 1969 in Uruguay.
#State #municipal #debt