Pol­gá­ri Szem­le, 13. évf. 1–3. szám, 2017, 7–9., DOI: 10.24307/psz.2017.0902

Jour­nal of Eco­no­mic Li­te­ra­tu­re (JEL) codes: A1, B3, F6, H10
Key­words: eco­no­mics, eco­no­mic his­to­ry, mig­ra­ti­on, Hun­gary

Wel­co­me by the Edi­tor-in-Chi­ef

I have been re­pea­tedly in­vi­ted to de­li­ver lec­tu­res at the con­fe­ren­ces held at Ba­la­ton­szár­szó and Ba­la­ton­lel­le ever since the re­sus­ci­ta­ti­on of the Hun­ga­ri­an Re­for­med Church’s Ly­ce­um 25 years ago from the old tra­di­tions of the Tea­cher Train­ing Col­l­e­ge of Sá­ros­pa­tak. This year’s in­vi­ta­ti­on also inc­lu­ded a se­pa­ra­te re­quest re­gard­ing the cont­ent. “Ple­a­se talk about the risks in­vol­ved in the 2018 ge­ne­ral el­ec­tions and the ex­ter­nal and in­ter­nal dang­ers that lie ahead of us,” I was told. It is not my habit to ga­in­say my bro­thers, espe­ci­ally on the 500th an­ni­ver­sary of the Re­for­mati­on, so I did ment­ion the mas­ses of Asi­ans and Afri­cans cong­est­ing our bor­ders in pre­pa­ra­ti­on for oc­cupying Euro­pe, and the th­reats and do­m­es­tic prob­lems they pose to us in my spe­ech de­li­ve­red to bishops and other church dig­ni­t­ari­es gat­he­red from Sub­car­pathia, the Par­ti­um, and other ter­rit­ori­es po­pu­la­ted by Hun­ga­ri­ans in the ne­igh­bou­ring count­ri­es and from over­se­as.

Aware of the na­tu­re of my add­ress, to ba­lance it in ad­vance and to he­ar­ten the Cal­vi­nist cong­re­ga­ti­on, I began my spe­ech with the achi­eve­ments of the righ­tist govern­ment and of the ope­ra­tions of the Na­ti­o­nal Bank of Hun­gary in sup­port of the Govern­ment’s fis­cal po­li­cy. I told them that next year’s bud­get, adop­ted a few weeks ear­li­er, al­lo­ca­tes HUF 81 bil­li­on more for edu­ca­ti­on, HUF 102 bil­li­on more for he­alth­ca­re, HUF 287 bil­li­on more for the sup­port of fa­mi­li­es, HUF 83 bil­li­on more for pub­lic se­cu­rity, and HUF 205 bil­li­on more for eco­no­mic de­ve­lop­ment than the bud­get app­ro­ved last year. Next year we can ex­pect Euro­pe’s lo­west per­so­nal in­co­me tax, cor­pora­te in­co­me tax unc­hang­ed at 9 per­cent and small en­ter­pri­se tax re­du­ced to 13 per­cent. The tax al­lo­wance for fa­mi­li­es with two child­ren will inc­re­a­se to HUF 35,000 per month, and HUF 226 bil­li­on will be ear­mar­ked for the hous­ing prog­ramme. Pen­sions will be inc­re­as­ed by the plan­ned in­fla­ti­on rate and, mo­re­o­ver, a pen­si­on pre­mi­um is also in the pi­pe­line de­pend­ing on eco­no­mic per­for­mance.

I emp­has­i­zed that the mac­ro­e­co­no­mic pre­con­di­ti­on for all of these provi­sions is to achi­eve 4.3 per­cent growth in the eco­nomy, a 2.4 per­cent govern­ment de­fi­cit, 3 per­cent in­fla­ti­on and a furt­her re­duc­ti­on in the govern­ment debt-to-GDP ratio. “Can a bet­ter fu­tu­re be hoped for? Can wel­fa­re and in­co­me con­di­tions be sha­ped more fa­vo­u­rably than this?” I quest­ion­ed the au­di­en­ce. Ba­rely. Hun­ga­ri­an so­ci­ety has ad­van­ced from the ne­ga­tive to the po­sit­ive do­ma­in. Rem­em­ber that by 2008, after six years of li­be­ral govern­ment, Hun­gary’s eco­nomy had col­lap­sed. It was rol­ling and tos­sing from a USD 25 bil­li­on loan gran­ted by the IMF, the World Bank and the Euro­pe­an Cent­ral Bank until 2010, which we were sadd­led with by the so­ci­a­lists under the le­aders­hip of Gyur­csány and Baj­nai. At that time, the eco­nomy cont­rac­ted by ne­arly 10 per­cent, pen­sions were on the dec­re­a­se, the num­ber of unemp­loyed rose, and the con­di­tions for start­ing a fa­mily and ra­ising child­ren de­te­ri­or­a­ted. Fa­mi­li­es, local govern­ments and the govern­ment bud­get were burd­e­ned with fo­rei­gn cur­rency loans. There was un­pre­ce­den­ted indeb­ted­ness at every level. This night­ma­re pe­ri­od is now a thing of the past.

The cons­o­li­da­ti­on of wel­fa­re and la­bour-mar­ket con­di­tions is hall­mar­ked by the wage ag­ree­ment sign­ed for 2017 by the govern­ment as the co­or­di­na­tor of la­bour­mar­ket pro­ces­ses with the in­vol­ve­ment of emp­loyers and emp­loye­es, the ef­fects of which are al­re­ady being felt. The mi­ni­mum wage for unsk­il­led wor­kers has inc­re­as­ed by 15 per­cent, and skil­led wor­kers’ gu­a­ran­te­ed mi­ni­mum wage by 25 per­cent, while the emp­loyers’ cont­ri­bu­ti­on was at the same time re­du­ced by 5 per­cen­tage points. In 2018 these fa­vo­u­rab­le de­ve­lop­ments will con­ti­nue. The mi­ni­mum wage for unsk­il­led wor­kers will inc­re­a­se by anot­her 8 per­cent, and we can ex­pect a 12-per­cent rise in the mi­ni­mum wage for se­con­dary-scho­ol gra­du­a­tes and a 2-per­cen­tage point drop in the emp­loyers’ cont­ri­bu­ti­on.

If I were asked to sum up Hun­ga­ri­an bud­ge­tary de­ve­lop­ments, I would cha­rac­te­ri­zed them as re­li­ab­le and stab­le. The count­ry’s govern­ment is cap­ab­le of adopt­ing the bud­get act six months be­fo­re the start of the next year to en­sure the con­di­tions for for­ward-lo­o­king ma­nag­ement by fa­mi­li­es and com­pa­ni­es alike. Th­ro­ugh wage ag­ree­ments and wel­fa­re and child be­ne­fit funds, stab­le pub­lic fi­nan­ces are tur­ning the years fol­lo­wing fis­cal and mo­ne­tary cons­o­li­da­ti­on into a bud­get for the emp­loyed. Th­ro­ugh the re­tent­ion of eco­no­mic growth, a furt­her inc­re­a­se can be ex­pec­ted in in­co­mes.

The key to the succ­ess achi­eved so far is the po­li­ti­cal aut­hori­za­ti­on gran­ted by the overw­helm­ing ma­jo­rity of the vo­ters du­ring every ge­ne­ral el­ec­ti­on since 2010, which pro­vi­des the basis for stab­le govern­ment. The ope­ra­ti­on of the righ­tist govern­ment and its ex­ten­si­on from el­ec­ti­on to el­ec­ti­on is le­gi­ti­mi­zed by ci­ti­zens th­ro­ugh the sta­bi­lity of their in­co­mes and by cor­pora­tions th­ro­ugh the sta­bi­lity of their ope­ra­tions. “Howe­ver, the con­ti­nu­a­ti­on may be jeo­p­ar­di­zed,” I conf­ront­ed the au­di­en­ce with the cold facts. Se­ve­ral mil­lions mig­rants are wa­i­ting along the bor­ders, spe­ci­fi­cally at the Hun­ga­ri­an check­points at Rösz­ke and Hor­gos and along the Ita­li­an co­asts, for ad­mis­si­on to a Euro­pe known for more than fifty years for its in­ter­nal peace, cons­o­li­da­ted so­ci­ety and the se­cu­rity of human life and the eco­nomy. Their road does not take them here by chance: they are bac­ked by busi­ness circ­les in­ter­es­ted in wea­ke­ning Euro­pe, inc­lu­ding Hun­gary.

On thou­sand and one hund­red years ago, in the pe­ri­od of King St. Step­hen, Hun­gary en­coun­te­red si­mil­ar pub­lic tro­ub­les. Do­m­es­tic di­vi­sions, po­wers in­tend­ing to sub­due the Hun­ga­ri­ans who had re­cently con­que­red the ter­ri­to­ry as their hom­eland and hosts of wars. King St Step­hen res­pon­ded by lay­ing the fo­un­da­tions of the Hun­ga­ri­an state, re­in­for­cing Ch­ris­ti­a­nity and sett­ing up the county ad­mi­nistra­ti­on.

After two lost wars, forty years of so­vi­et oc­cu­pa­ti­on and the con­co­mit­ant fo­rei­gn so­ci­ety and eco­nomy, and two de­ca­des of un­succ­ess­ful neo­li­be­ral at­tempts at tran­sit­i­on to a mar­ket-eco­nomy, Hun­gary needs to be re­built. A new Fun­da­men­tal Law and es­sen­ti­al laws in fi­nance were adop­ted to crea­te the pre­con­di­tions for eco­no­mic sta­bi­lity in the count­ry. Pub­lic ad­mi­nistra­ti­on had to be re­or­ga­ni­zed, a so­ci­ety built on work and an eco­no­mic po­li­cy ne­e­ded to be crea­ted that is open to the chang­ing world while en­for­cing na­ti­o­nal cha­rac­te­r­is­tics along with the app­rop­ria­te eco­no­mic edu­ca­ti­on. King St Step­hen’s reign was also dis­tur­bed by fac­ti­o­nal people, who fai­led or did not want to see the sig­ni­fi­cance of Hun­ga­ri­ans’ sur­vi­val, just as we have fac­ti­o­nal in­ter­nal ene­mi­es who wish to put us to the sword to re­ta­in their ob­so­le­te ideas and the re­la­ted fi­nan­cial gains. Our achi­eve­ments are at stake. Just as in the pe­ri­od of the great king, we need the pers­is­ten­ce of Ch­ris­ti­ans and in­tel­lec­tu­als to stand up for the count­ry – Hun­gary is cal­ling for help today. Wit­hin and ac­ross the bor­ders. We need our com­mu­ni­ti­es to unite and close them­sel­ves off, and the ske­pti­cal to be con­vin­ced by rea­son­ab­le ar­gu­ments and kept in the flock. We can only re­ma­in strong if we re­ta­in our re­li­gi­on and faith in Hun­gary. And we badly need this as not only the succ­es­ses of the past seven years but also the Hun­ga­ri­an state built du­ring a thou­sand and one hund­red years and the achi­eve­ments of the Re­for­mati­on have been put under th­re­at.

Fil­ling this struggle with aca­de­mic know­ledge is the ser­vi­ce pro­vi­ded by the edi­to­ri­al board of Pol­gá­ri Szem­le and our aut­hors. The stu­di­es pub­lis­hed in this issue touch upon the aca­de­mic pre­s­en­ta­ti­on of our achi­eve­ments, the ef­fects of the fa­mily fo­un­da­ti­on and hous­ing sup­port in inc­re­a­sing the num­ber of births, the bud­ge­tary and so­ci­al achi­eve­ments of cent­ral price re­gu­la­ti­on (cut in uti­lity pri­ces), and about King St Step­hen’s laws in a Euro­pe­an con­text aut­hor­ed by the aca­de­mic Gábor Hamza, mem­ber of the Hun­ga­ri­an Aca­demy of Sci­en­ces.

I wish you ple­as­ant read­ing and whol­esome in­tel­lec­tu­al ple­a­sure!

Pro­fes­sor Csaba Lent­ner,
Edi­tor-in-chi­ef of Pol­gá­ri Szem­le