Pensions to be adjusted for inflation in January: government seeking 5 billion

The manoeuvre game gradually enters into full swing and the pensions abacus is enriched with new numbers. Maintaining the status quo, i.e. the division by income brackets already experienced this year, the revaluation of cheques would cost around five billion in 2026. The figure is gross of the tax return that the increases would automatically generate and is the starting point calculated by the technicians available to the government for the overall assessments of the budget law. The calculation at current legislation starts from the inflation assumption for 2025, which, according to data released in August, is currently at 1.7 per cent.

The planned expenditure on pensions this year, including welfare pensions, is about 355 billion. If the 1.7 per cent were applied unconditionally to all expenditure, the resources needed would be more than 6 billion, but if one takes into account precisely the revaluation on the basis of the pension income brackets envisaged by the last budget law for 2025 (100 per cent for cheques up to four times the minimum pension, 90 per cent for those between four and five times the minimum pension, and 75 per cent for those above five times the minimum pension), the expenditure drops to around five billion.

On pensions, however, the manoeuvre menu could be much longer. In the second half of August, there were many hypotheses, starting from the willingness expressed by the League through the undersecretary of Labour, Claudio Durigon, to use the severance pay as an annuity to be able to anticipate the exit from work at the age of 64. The severance pay could also be the source on which to draw to give a new boost to complementary social security, a pillar that the government aims to strengthen as an increasingly necessary alternative to the public system. The executive's commitment will, however, in all likelihood also focus on the freezing of the three-month increase in the retirement age provided for by the Fornero law as of 2027 as an adjustment to life expectancy. According to some technical calculations, it could cost around three billion euros when fully implemented, but in the first year the burden could be less.

A helping hand in terms of coverage could come from falling government bond yields and the resulting lower interest expenditure: according to simulations by industry associations and confirmed in the last few hours to Bloomberg by sources close to the dossier, the treasure that could be accumulated over two years would be around 13 billion euros.

Meanwhile, after the Lega Italia meeting held last week, it was Forza Italia that took stock of the party's priorities. In the meeting of the Azzurri leaders, led by the secretary, Antonio Tajani, eleven key requests were reiterated, largely focused on the need to give salaries a break. The first, the real flagship proposal of FI, is the lowering of the second Irpef rate from 35 to 33% for incomes up to 60,000 euro. Then they look at wages through the detaxation of production bonuses, overtime, holidays and thirteenth month bonuses, as announced just yesterday by Tajani himself, and on the lowest wages. Looking at companies, the Azzurri re-propose the bonus IRES, which could also be stabilised on the basis of Confindustria's requests. Lastly, on the banks, the favourite object of this summer's manoeuvre-market (as Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti called it), the invitation is to 'continue in the method of confrontation with the banking system to obtain support for the economy', without going into the merit of possible new taxes for the moment. Noi Moderati, on the other hand, is aiming higher: at the exemption from Irpef for the first four years of work, an increase in deductions for school expenses, more contributions to parity schools, and the elimination of the cap on the five per thousand earmarked for voluntary associations.