Natalya Zubarevich: "There is no clarity in subsidies to the regions from the federal center"

10 сентября 2020, 16:32
Natalya Zubarevich, professor of the Department of Economic and Social Geography of Moscow State University, director of the regional program of the Independent Institute for Social Policy, gave an assessment of the state system for distributing subsidies to regions.

She also talked about who is the poorest in our country, - children.

“...The federal government is one story, and Moscow is the beneficiary. It is impossible to govern such a huge country with a vertical stick, it is always ineffective. Why treat dandruff when you need to treat a completely different disease?

We have no federalization. If someone calls the delegation of some particular powers to the regions federalization, the flag is in your hands. Actually, this is called shifting responsibility, and nothing more.

I know quite well about federalism, and so there is no question there. What we saw recently was the shifting of some of the powers of "opening" and "closing". And you know what miracles happened in our statistics on the number of sick and dead. Any plan must be followed.

This is reasonable from the point of view of making decisions on the spot, as it is better known there. But when the responsibility is shifted to you, you will be the scapegoat if something goes wrong. So this is not federalism, but a completely different story.

… All recipes have been known for a long time. All transfers for the last year are known: 2, 6 trillion rubles. Quite a lot of money, frankly.

But it is necessary to help, there are holes in the budget in the regions.

And now, at the peak of the situation, they began to help correctly - they began to give more subsidies.

In crisis conditions, when you receive subsidies, you spend them, what is more important to spend - you figure it out yourself.

But our budgetary system works differently outside of stressful conditions.

Only one of these subsidies is calculated using the formula. And in different years this is from a quarter to 30% of all transfers. And everything else we have is very curiously arranged.

The ministry distributes subsidies.

How? They have their own methods. Do we know anything about them? Not.

All governors and vice-governors run around the ministries and beat out these subsidies.

There are very interesting subsidies - "nominal": Chechnya, Crimea, Sevastopol. There are other types of subsidies - for balance. They are also very interestingly distributed.

There are subventions, this is what the feds have the right to give. But they grow very slowly, as if nothing rises in price.

And finally, the last thing. There is also such a charm as “other interbudgetary transfers”. Last year, it was almost a quarter of all regional transfers.

Maybe, after all, in this "conservatory" to make it so that there is a formula calculation? So that the region knows what it will get.

And this “other” includes some kind of medicinal provision, and something for Kaliningrad in a “special zone” ... Yes, the devil will break his leg there!

But when things are so difficult - am I being careful about it? - in this "uneasy" it is very convenient to keep the regions on the hook.

If we had a formula distribution, depending on poverty, on the tax base ... Yes: the weakest need to be brought up to a certain level, because it is no longer possible to lower it, otherwise there will not be enough for education and health care. And then there is a lot of interesting things.

Therefore, we need transparency and clear rules.

Yes, we are a country with a very different tax base. And the phrase “let's leave taxes to the regions” ... I’ll tell you this: for Magadan and Kamchatka, practically everything that they have there is left. And not a small part of the regions of the Far East too. AND?

Kamchatka is 60% subsidized, for a minute.

These are our tax bases. Therefore, we live on oil and gas rent.

And since we live on it, I have a question: is it possible to make the rules of the game - that is, this redistribution - understandable, transparent, and not so that everyone hangs on a hook?

... The taxes of the Omsk region go to St. Petersburg, GazpromNeft pays them to St. Petersburg, you are left with a donut hole.

But if you take other federal taxes, these are VAT and mineral extraction tax, if you leave them in the regions, do you know who will receive the lion's share?

We take VAT, the final consumption is paid from it, and where do we have the most final consumption? In the largest agglomerations: Moscow, Mosoblast, St. Petersburg.

If we take a tax on the extraction of minerals - this is purely oil and gas, then this is Yamal and further down the list.

Therefore, if we leave these taxes in the regions, the rich will become even richer.

This is not the problem; the rent must be collected. The problem is how we redistribute.

And why, for example, in Crimea and Sevastopol, per capita budget revenues are one and a half times higher than the average for Russia. Until recently, Chechnya had up to 1.2%.

So the question is, how do we redistribute, that's where the dog is buried. And this is again about the vertical and political control.

… The 12 trillion that Russia had in reserve was spent very little. It was 12, 8, and 12, 1 trillion rubles remained.

There was a carryover trillion since last year, they did not "spend", they put it into action. They sold Sberbank, changed the owner, there are 4 trillion, one was allowed in this year. Bonds are being issued now.

And this stash is spent very, very carefully, you know why?

The first reason. The lost revenues of the regional budgets, according to the old estimates, were 1.3 trillion, and now in the Accounts Chamber, I heard that it could reach 2 trillion.

The lost revenue of the federal budget for this year is exactly 2 trillion, the oil and gas part there is mainly, that is, in total, it turns out already under 4 trillion.

And this is only for this year, but how are we going to come out?

How much money to pay for support measures? It's not all that simple.

But what has healed, I agree. It could have been better to help.

Already, children's allowances for three months in a row at 10,000 rubles could definitely be given.

Our children are the poorest in the country, if anyone did not know.

We have child poverty now, according to calculations, while there is no data, somewhere between 23 and 26%.

And the general poverty, also according to calculations, according to models, will grow from 12.5% to 16%. Every fourth child in our country lives in a poor family.

The children needed more help. This is not difficult to do. And this money is tolerable for the federal budget”.

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