The result on the last year of the Bolsonaro government was released this Friday
Brasilia – For the first time since 2013, the federal government accounts in the last year of government Jair Bolsonaroclosed positive in 2022. The result of revenue less expenses (except the payment of interest on the public debt) was positive for R$ 54 billion – equal to 0.5% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
There have been eight consecutive years of public account deficits, a situation that has increased public debt and undermined the credibility of the government’s fiscal policy.

When he took office, the former economy minister, Paul Guedespromised to reverse the deficit in the first year of the Bolsonaro government.
However, the positive balance only occurred at the end of his government, after the holes in the spending ceiling (the rule that limits the growth of spending) to relaunch electoral measures in 2022, which caused a deterioration in the public finances picture and an increase in fiscal uncertainties – the reason for the subsequent warnings of the Central Bank, which is working to contain the increase in inflation and has set the country’s base interest rate at 13.7%.
The improvement in the fiscal result in 2021 and 2022 is a cause for heated debates on the real state of the government accounts.
Guedes reiterates that the result of the public finances, which he delivered at the end of December, highlighted a trend towards the consolidation of the public finances, which in his opinion would have been interrupted by the approval of the transitional PEC. The constitutional amendment was negotiated by the new government to increase spending in 2023 and allow Lula to deliver on his campaign promises, many of which were also made by Bolsonaro.
The new finance minister Fernando Haddadand ministers to the president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva they say they have received a “cursed inheritance” and a “scorched earth” situation, which required a strengthening of the Budget to restore public policies. A feud that mirrors the picture of polarization in the economic debate, which persists in the country after the elections.
Although the data showed a one-off improvement last year, the expectation is that in 2023 the state accounts will again register a deficit with the increase in expenditure already contracted by the transitional constitutional amendment, approved last year.
The 2023 budget projects a deficit of 231.5 billion reais. Haddad presented a plan of measures to reverse this gap and bring public finances into surplus between the end of this year and the first quarter of 2024.
Haddad said a decline from the gap to something between R$90 billion and R$100 billion was warranted. The market expects a deficit of 1.1% of GDP (about R$110 billion), according to the latest Focus survey by the Central Bank.
The positive balance in 2022 was driven by the increase in revenues. After the Covid-19, which brought the fiscal deficit to 9.8% of GDP, with increased spending on the war budget to deal with the impact of the pandemic on the life of businesses and Brazilians, the Bolsonaro government has benefited from ‘increase of recipes. The Bolsonaro government also pushed spending to 2023 in the final stretch of last year to meet above all the commitments of the former president’s allied parliamentary leaders with the issuance of amendments to the secret budget. As shown the StageR $ 20 billion was released in the last days of the government.
The 2022 numbers were released today by the Treasury, already under the new leadership of the Lula government.
From red to blue; See the evolution of public finances in 2013
2013: surplus of 1.4% of GDP
2014: deficit of 0.4% of GDP
2015: deficit of 2% of GDP
2016: deficit of 2.6% of GDP
2017: deficit of 1.9% of GDP
2018: deficit of 1.7% of GDP
2019: deficit of 1.3% of GDP
2020: deficit of 9.8% of GDP
2021: deficit of 0.4% of GDP
2022: surplus of 0.5% of GDP
Source: Terra

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