Teodora Cardoso against the deficit limit in the constitution – Renaissance

Teodora Cardoso against the deficit limit in the constitution – Renaissance

The limits of the budget deficit and public debt “shall not be” enshrined in the Constitution, defends the Chairman of the Public Finance (CFP).

Teodora Cardoso opposes the imposition in the Basic Law limits on deficit and debt, considering that it would lead to “practical solutions to overcome these limits.”

At a conference organized by the PAC, Banco de Portugal and Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, this Friday in Lisbon, the economist said that putting a limit of 3% of GDP budget deficit in the Constitution “would be a thing completely impractical. “

Teodora Cardoso warns that if these limits were defined in the Constitution, compliance would be very susceptible to” rodeos. ” “If such a limit was in the Constitution, the Government would not fall for breaching the limit, but was unconstitutional, which was a big trouble,” he stresses.

In the text that formed the basis of his intervention, Teodora Cardoso states that “too inflexible principles enshrined in the Constitution – for example, fixing the numerical fiscal deficit or the public debt ratio limits – are not advisable and lose credibility.”

This is because the inclusion of these limits in the Constitution “practices to induce the bypass, limiting the scope of government or leading to the use of creative accounting bills”, says the Chairman of the Public Finance.