Among other results, the Sánchez-Feijóo debate caused some confusion about the economic health of the country. When it comes to perceptions, answering how we are is not easy: families talk about it as they please. But since we are 19 million households, the appreciations of each one are misleading: they remind those lousy social scientists who resort to their experience as a synonym for argumentative solvency.
Can there be different truths? To illustrate where we are, I recommend a look at the behavior of Spanish economic agents, published this week by the INE. Let me outline some features.
A relevant aspect is the growing weight of foreign sales: from 29% of GDP in 2000 to more than 42% in the first quarter of 2023, a historical high. A gain that reflects that of exports of goods (from 20% to 30% of GDP) and non-tourist services (from 3.6% to 7%), while tourist services remain close to a 5.5% of GDP.
This improvement is expressed in the change of sign of financial flows with the rest of the world. Since the sixties, the balance of the exchange of goods, services, income and current transfers had been, with the exception of recessions, systematically negative: we spent more than we produced, and the difference was left to us by the outside world. In 2008, the accumulation of that debt with the rest of the world approached 100% of GDP and it was the impossibility of paying it back that put the country between the horses’ legs. But the adjustments made from 2009-2010 have brought about a substantial change: instead of asking for funds from the rest of the world to finance part of our internal spending, since 2011 we have left them.
Do families perceive those positive macroeconomic realities? Some for sure: in the first quarter of 2023, household wage income increased by 7.8% annually, a reflection of the increase in average wages and employment (about 370,000 new employees according to the EPA); add to those, the balance of property and company income and social benefits (in particular, pensions), which have also increased substantially. And, subtracting taxes and consumption, savings emerge: from -1.5% of family income in the first quarter of 2022 to 0.9% in the first quarter of 2023. It’s not bad either.
So how are we doing? As you look at it: as the classic said, everyone talks about the fair as they like. Although many were not doing well yesterday, they are not doing well today and, probably, they will not be doing well tomorrow: for decades we have had more than 20% of poor families and almost 30% of the children who live there. But that being true, we know what it means that the country as a whole is doing badly: we all lost, between 2008 and 2012, although some more than others. But this July of uncertain future, this is not the case: to Caesar, what is Caesar’s.
