Translated material
Kudrin thinks differently than Gref
The government postponed consideration of the three-year financial plan
The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Economic Development have different hypotheses regarding priorities in the economy. As a result, where the chief economist sees growth, the chief financier sees a reduction in budget revenues. Further discrepancies in the approaches of the two departments emerged yesterday at a meeting of the budget commission chaired by Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov. The commission had to approve the three-year financial plan for 2007-2009, prepared by the Ministry of Finance. But she didn't approve.Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin handed over the three-year plan to the government with the help of his deputy Tatyana Golikova. She handled numbers with enviable ease for forty minutes. Revenues according to the plan in 2007 will amount to 5828.48 billion rubles, in 2008 - 66587.44 billion, in 2009 - 7034.18 billion. The stabilization fund in 2007 should reach 3067.04 billion rubles, in 2008 - 4060.48 billion, in 2009 - 5047.22 billion. Budget expenditures in 2007 were planned by the Ministry of Finance in the amount of 5334.90 billion rubles, in 2008 - 6109.48 billion , in 2009 - 6655.67 billion.
And everything, it would seem, was heading towards the Ministry of Finance accepting this plan. Moreover, Mikhail Fradkov pointed out at the very beginning that work on it was “unacceptably delayed.” But then the question arose: how did the three-year plan take into account the scenario conditions for socio-economic development adopted by the government on March 23, prepared by the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade? It turned out that the Ministry of Finance took into account Gref's research, but not entirely. That is, the financiers wanted to take into account the economists' scenario. However, when they began to calculate the three-year financial plan according to it, they discovered an inevitable shortage of income and decided to leave the financial plan the same, without taking into account the scenario of German Gref's department, only indexing the main parameters.
The country's chief economist was indignant, but Ms. Golikova explained to him on her fingers that the scenario was “with a hole.” And that the Ministry of Finance has the only correct account, because it does it according to the methodology. Moreover, German Gref was pointed out that earlier, when he agreed on the first version of the financial plan for three years, he had no comments.
“We have different hypotheses,” defended the Mertovites. Although their arguments weakly convinced the prime minister that there was a chance to bring the positions of the two ministries closer together, they still led to a postponement. The Ministry of Finance was given a week to finalize it. During this time, by order of the Prime Minister, Alexei Kudrin and German Gref must “sit down together and compare their hypotheses.”
At the same time, everyone understands perfectly well that the Ministry of Finance proposed in advance not just a tough financial plan, but the most conservative one possible, so that there was somewhere to retreat. The prime minister nevertheless decided to point out to the chief financier the game with hidden reserves. And he said this: now we see excess profits in advance and do not touch them, but we know that later we will still share them. In this case, Mr. Fradkov asked the Minister of Finance to stop talking about how spending additional income would lead to inflation. You shouldn't flog yourself, they say.
But the chief financier has never betrayed himself and will definitely say that spending additional income is really promoting inflation. Even if he gives in.