That is the status quo before a hard-pressed government, after a series of crises, will start work on the proposal for the state budget for 2024. The proposal will not be presented until October, but many important political battles are already taking place in the next few days at Klækken hotell in Ringerike. Finance Minister Trygve Slagsvold Vedum (Sp) believes that the world, our trading partners, the Norwegian economy – and perhaps even the government – are about to get their heads above water. It was a demanding 2022 and 2023 where spending was tightened. An unusual amount was unusually uncertain. It is moving towards a 2023 and 2024 where the government does not have to keep as much to be on the safe side. This means that you will dare to spend a little more money. Vedum and Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre (Ap) will talk a lot about the positive prospects. It is an important message to convey to Norwegians who are afraid of interest rate increases, price increases, the electricity price crisis and the future of their own private finances, that there is likely to be an improvement in store. The state can spend more money next year. The government has a little more room for maneuver than it has had in the past year. Ukraine-related expenses are increasing greatly, but the electricity subsidy will probably cost less. 2024 is also the first year the politician benefits from income from the so-called salmon tax. In addition, there are large energy revenues, although most of it goes straight into the oil fund, and cannot be directly used to fulfill election promises in the national budget. For all the politicians who will create the budget for the whole of Norway, it is also good news that it is less uncertain. But it is safe and certain that it will not be the same as before. We have long known that the 20s will give us a new national economic normal. This government will face a challenge that Erna Solberg (prime minister from 2013-2021) and Jens Stoltenberg (prime minister from 2005-2013) did not have: The big money will go to issues that will not necessarily win voters over in the election campaigns in the coming years, writes politik commentator Lars Nehru Sand. Photo: Halvard Alvik / NTB scanpix There is less room for maneuver in the national budget year by year. The big money will go to grey, boring measures. Priorities on which it is impossible to win voters, because everyone will take it for granted. The room for action is eaten up faster No politician will be praised for delivering basic welfare. But an increasingly large part of the state budget will go to this very thing: Welfare services in the municipalities Social security and pension expenses Defense and preparedness Increasing expenses for the hospitals For next year especially also: Continued electricity support Direct and indirect expenses as a result of the war in Ukraine, both the Ukraine package and refugee reception Norwegian municipalities will settle a record number of Ukrainian refugees during 2022 and 2023. It will cost us many billions of kroner. The picture is from Nordstrand school, which has taken in several Ukrainian students in the past year. These things have in common that it is extremely important, very basic, politically gray and something no voter would be impressed by if it were to appear on a brightly colored election poster. It is simply politically gray. But in the years to come, gray will have to be great, the budgets will go up. It is a new reality. The governments of the 2000s have so far come to budget work in March with prospects of between NOK 10 and 20 billion in “free” room for maneuver. The growth in the economy has been greater than the growth in public expenditure. The governments have been able to create state budgets knowing that they have extra money to spare, having allocated money for the same amount as the previous year. A bit like if you get real wage growth: If food, electricity, summer holidays and everything else are the same as the previous year, you will have money left. When expenses grow more than income, the opposite happens. You have to cut expenses, or increase income. In the years to come, it will not be NOK 20 billion, but NOK 0. The government “gets absolutely free without having to make cuts”. That is the big shift in the government’s budget work: Increased room for action to fulfill new fun election promises will not come by itself in the years to come. Either taxes have to go up, or other expenses have to go down, if a government wants to bet on something new, fun and expensive. Because the boring, self-evident, gray stuff is going to demand a lot more than it has in the past few decades. A finance minister would rightly be able to say that the fundamentals must be the main investment. Gray must be great. Other ministers are unlikely to agree. Politicians who talk about water and sewage deserve a pat on the back. A lot of money will have to go to important but invisible investments in Norwegian municipalities going forward. Photo: Nadir Alam We have known for a long time that this was the situation in the 20th century. What has been the future and theory is about to become painful reality. The reality may not have sunk into the public discourse, politicians’ promises and the demands of various pressure groups. Demographics and sewage Also in upcoming election campaigns, politicians will talk warmly about dental health reform and new cultural centers. These are important matters. But there is good reason to also give a pat on the back to politicians who speak at least as warmly about increased demographic costs (in practice increased expenditure on health and care as a result of more elderly people) and a backlog of investments in the sewer network in the municipalities. Gray is also great, in its own way. Vedum’s 2024 budget is seriously an encounter with the new normal. Future governments will get a taste of the same medicine. In larger doses. The worst thing for those who make the national budget is uncertainty. So the fact that it is certain that it will be difficult to find money is not worse. Just almost as difficult to explain to voters.
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Can gray be great? – Speech
