“Once unemployment benefits have ended, the unemployed do not return to the labour market. With other benefits and the black market, they maintain their income levels”.
Epidemics, floods, volcanoes, fires, and the Spanish economy keeps on going. The FT dedicates a laudatory editorial: “Spain is a bright spot among European economies since early 2024, growing at an average annual rate of 3% compared to just over 1% for the eurozone as a whole”. Rating agencies are upgrading Spain's rating, leading to a corresponding improvement in the risk premium; the cost of issuing public debt is drastically cut. Spain is a solvent country. In the Cantabrian community, the head of the economy tells me that unemployment, at 7%, is the lowest in Spain and does not reflect the reality at all. There is no unemployment. What is lacking is labour. Voluntary unemployment that is not identified in the statistics. After unemployment benefits end, the unemployed do not return to the labour market. With various social assistance benefits and the black market, they maintain their income levels. A collaborator from Consejeros tells me that his daughter, a specialist doctor in the social security system, intended to hold an event at the converted railway station of Canfranc. Impossible. A 5-month wait to get a spot. Domestic consumption is strongly driving production, accompanied by a firm and growing trend in domestic investment, as highlighted by FUNCAS.
All this is very well, but the dark clouds of corruption are also present. Corruption in the family and in the party of President Sánchez. His Attorney General is in the dock, and the Minister of Equality is in a difficult balancing act over protective bracelets for women. And there are also those tremendous waves of immigrants. The new and rabid Catalan right proclaims that the children of immigrants who attend educational centres receive free meals. And that they make up 50% of the total beneficiaries. This claim has been denied by a local newspaper, which shows that they do not reach 25%. But the family and collaborators of the president and the facilities for immigrants send a powerful message. Spain is in dire straits. Only judges like Hurtado and Peinado can set things right. A colossal fine reduced the very next day by half, just when the Provincial Court of Málaga releases the Dutch mafia boss wanted by all European police. I also suffered the imposition of fines when the instructor of the Intelhorce case demanded 10 billion pesetas from me. The trial amounted to nothing but lasted 7 years without me being able to gather that amount.
Fortunately, Spain is moving forward, and the Ecuadorian or Peruvian immigrants who returned to their countries during the recession of 2009-12 are being replaced by others who sign up and contribute to the growth of the Spanish economy. Beyond our borders, there is war in Ukraine and a holocaust or massacre in Gaza. The PP leans towards massacre, which also appears in a column of the FAZ: “The conquest of the city of Gaza implies the expulsion of the population, but a characteristic note of genocide is to provoke living conditions that lead to the destruction of a group. Mere expulsion is not genocide; it also requires annihilation”. Awaiting the judgment of the Hague Tribunal...♦