Finance Minister: Hungary’s Economic Growth Sustainable
- 5 Jul 2018 7:17 AM
- Hungary Matters
International economic players agree with the government’s assessment that Hungary is on a sustainable growth path, allowing the economy to expand by about 4% both this year and the next, the finance minister told commercial InfoRádió.
The growth path Hungary has been on since 2013 has also been supported by the external environment, Mihály Varga said.
Varga said the 2019 budget would ensure steady economic growth, noting that reserves will be increased by 50% to more than 300 billion forints (EUR 909.2m).
The minister acknowledged that the budget calculates with a stronger HUF/EUR exchange rate than the rates seen in recent weeks, but said he did not believe that the weakening of the forint posed a risk to the general public or the balance of the budget.
Inflation continues to remain below 3% and the oil price is not critical either, so the government does not plan on intervening, Varga said. He added, however, that the central bank was closely monitoring the forint exchange rate and could count on the government’s help should it need to step in.
Varga underlined the importance of shifting fostered workers to the primary labour market, increasing tax preferences for families with two children and increasing education and health-care spending with a view to reaching full employment and expanding family subsidies.
He said the government was not planning further reductions in the personal income tax rate for the time being, but was not ruling out eventually bring it into the single digits.
MTI Photo: Koszticsák Szilárd
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