Coronacrisis: What does the Institute of Economics of the Russian Academy of Sciences offer the government?

The scale of the fall in GDP this year is not the main question. More importantly, how the country will go out of the crisis. This is determined by the effectiveness of the anti -crisis measures and how thoughtful steps will be thoughtful to the transition to the new development model and the new growth quality. Experts of the Institute of Economics have prepared their proposals.

The costs of Russia

To date, it is still difficult to assess the costs of implementing declared measures to combat coronavirus in Russia. Given the payments of the population and medical staff, subsidies to enterprises and credit rates, purchases of drugs and medical equipment, investments in converting and expanding new and high -tech beds, their volume is unlikely to be less than 3 % of Russian GDP, but this is ten times less than in economically developed countries. For comparison, the scale of anti -crisis measures as a percentage of GDP account for 37 %in Germany, in Italy - 20 %, in the UK - 16 %, in France - 14 %, in the USA - 12.4 %.

What can be done with taxes and loans

In our opinion, additional measures of tax policy could be involved in the short -term period:

A decrease to 0 % of the federal component of the income tax rate of organizations related to the group of industries, most affected by coronaviral infection, in 2020–2021.

In 2020, against the background of the fall of not only real, but also nominal income of the population, it seems appropriate to additional (two -time) increase in the standard tax deduction for children (from 1400 rubles per month for the first and second child to 2800 rubles, and the same increase in other positions) for individual income tax.

The repayment and prolongation of overdue credit debt of Russians to banks. As a result of pandemia Covid-19, this debt will increase significantly. Therefore, the Bank of Russia needs to develop a set of priority measures aimed at supporting (debiting hopeless loans and prolonging loans to 25 % of the average monthly salary) of citizens who are faced with a reduction in income as a result of pandemic.

What can be done with the problem of unemployed

The possibilities of not just obtaining the status of the unemployed should be expanded, but the right to receive benefits, and in the maximum amount - 12 130 rubles. It is necessary to increase the terms of payment: for some of our citizens, the allowance for the crisis period should be guaranteed minimum income. It would be reasonable to use the unused labor potential of the population on public work - when extinguishing forest fires, conducting environmental events, for working in nursing homes, orphanages, animal shelters, etc. For persons participating in these socially significant types of work, the state could increase payments to 2–4 sizes of the minimum wage depending on social significance, severity and dangers of labor.

What can be done with the development of small and medium -sized enterprises

The industry structure of the Russian SME has remained almost unchanged since the mid-1990s. In 2018, the share of wholesale and retail trade, the repair of vehicles and motorcycles was 57.2 %in the volume of turnover of the SME. 10.2 %accounted for the processing production, 10.8 %for construction, for transportation and storage and for real estate operations - 4 %each, for professional, scientific and technical activities - 3.3 %, for agricultural activities - 2.45 %, for mining, power supply, gas and ferry, air conditioning - 1.2 %, and others for others for others. Activities - 6.9 %.

However, from the SMEs of the highly developed countries, Russian SMEs are very distinguished by low innovation . So, according to Rosstat for 2017, only 5.2 % of Russian small enterprises carry out technological innovations (for comparison, in the EU, the share of such SMEs is more than 30 %).

At the same time, all the decisions of SMEs adopted this year relate to tactical measures, they are aimed at compensating for damage to the SME. Under such conditions, additional funds received by the population will go mainly not to the sphere of SMEs, but to large network trade structures.

The emphasis should be placed on indicators characterizing the degree of maturity and economic stability of SMEs, and, accordingly, on tools that provide this stability. First of all, these are indicators as:

• the share of SMEs engaged in economic activity for more than 10 years (sustainable demography of SMEs);

• "Dynevization" of the economic activity of the SME;

• Investment activity of SMEs and capital resources per 1 subject of SMEs;

• the number of constantly busy employees per 1 subject of SMEs;

• expenses for R&D per 1 subject of SMEs and/or the share of innovative products produced in the SME sector;

• the range of economic activities of SMEs and the volume of their cooperative interactions with large businesses;

• The share of SMEs acting within the territory with a special management regime, etc.

“The constant sadness of our economists, sociologists, that we have a small share of small business in a gross domestic product, is just due to the fact that we do not have a diversified big business,” explained Ruslan Greenberg, the supervisor of IE RAS, at one of the recent scientific conferences. “But this does not mean that there are no people who would like to realize their spirit of entrepreneurship.” Although there will still be a big difference between the West and us in low innovative activities. In my opinion, six times lower in our small and medium-sized businesses, innovative activities. But, again, this is due to the fact that we do not have a large diversified business that would make orders for small. ”

Greenberg adds: “My friends, good economists, say:“ You correctly think that direct payments for employers are needed, and employers have nothing to give. ” Why is there nothing to give employers? Because our economy is primitive, it is wrong. This logic: if we give money to businessmen, then they will simply restore the same structure that was before the pandemic. ”

Progressive personal income tax

The implementation of the social priority should be supported by the transition to progressive taxation of individuals (personal income tax) with the introduction of a minimum tax on the taxpayer himself and his children (at the subsistence minimum level) - to reduce the tax load on low -profit categories and maintain demand from their first necessities. The following scale may be proposed: the 13 % rate applies to annual taxable income up to 600 thousand rubles, the rate of 20 % applies to income in the interval of 600,000-3,000,000 rubles, the 30 % rate is applied to income over 3 million rubles.

“In my opinion, the movement towards the progressive tax is still somewhat half -half in the form in which it sounded from the president. Firstly, the bet still does not increase very much, and then they say that this money will be used in a targeted way. According to our estimates, there would be a more significant increase in progression, ”said Mikhail Golovnin, deputy director of the institute. To the question of whether the threshold for increasing personal income tax is 600 thousand rubles, Golovnin replied that this is a discussion issue and thresholds can be changed.

Soft monetary policy

After completing the active phase of the fight against coronavirus, the Bank of Russia needs for some time (tentatively-until the beginning of 2023) to implement a relatively soft monetary policy in order to create the necessary conditions for the speedy restoration of the Russian economy and its further development.

“Since I wrote a financial block directly in the report, with regard to monetary policy, I believe that positive changes have occurred: the rate was reduced, the line was determined to mitigate the monetary policy, so the criticism that is contained in the report was clearly or implicitly,” said Golovnin.

Elimination of monopolism in fuel and energy systems

Monopolism and the lack of real opportunities for the development of small and medium-sized energy companies in the country of an economic and innovative and technological initiative. To increase the efficiency of production, reduce costs and prices, introduce new technologies, the monopoly has no incentives. She receives her income with a low technical production level.

Monopolism is one of the reasons that Gazprom does not engage in gas processing does not develop gasochemistry. Only competition in world markets can force monopoly companies such as Gazprom to reduce costs, increase production efficiency, innovative development and implementation of modern technologies.

In turn, Russia's oil companies divided the country by regions and control fuel prices.

Oil and oil refineries have “mastered” cashuid vehicles well, do not have infrastructure and experience in the commodity exchange and do not strive to increase the transparency of the state market. An accelerated depreciation can be an important tool for increasing the efficiency of the fuel and energy system.

Despite the fact that depreciation is exempted from income tax and should be strictly spent on updating fixed assets and expanded reproduction, about 70 % of these deductions are spent not for its intended purpose in the fuel and energy complex. The adoption of a law on depreciation policy can change the current situation. In the legislation on depreciation policy, it is necessary to provide:

• reduction in current terms of renewal of fixed assets;

• Hard control over the target consumption of depreciation.

“As for the budget, in general - positive shifts, but the most important problem there is a structural restructuring of the economy, but there is still no final solution, in my opinion. What will happen after passing the pandemic - we do not have an exact answer yet. There are some progress, but some cardinal solutions are not visible here, ”Golovnin concluded.