Percentages in hand, almost a point is missing. With the data on the development of inflation in December, Istat also provided the average change for 2022, which at 8.1 percent reached the highest level since 1985. This is not a simple statistical oddity: the average increase serves as a reference for a range of services that are re-evaluated annually, starting at pensions. Except that in the case of social security examinations, the adjustment operation is pre-established on the basis of a preliminary estimate so that it can start in the month of January. In mid-November, a ministerial decree had the sentence of upgrade at 7.3 percent. Since then, however, two things have happened: the executive has revised the rules by removing the adjustment to treatments for amounts over 2,100 euros gross per month, and the statistical office has announced the annual development. So between the 7.3 percent on which the calculations were based and the 8.1 percent that result in the final balance sheet a 0.8 percent gap for inflation non-recovery has opened, starting with the lowest pensions that have already experienced the increase. We are talking about amounts that are not gigantic, but which are not negligible for low earners: With a monthly gross check of 1,500 euros, the missing allowance is worth 12, on an annual basis over 150.
THE RULES
what will happen now The law stipulates that any difference between the forecast and the actual change will be repaid in the following year, i.e. in this case at the beginning of 2024, together with the backlog and the recovery triggered in the meantime by the further inflation recorded during the year 2023 had the However, the then executive made a different choice and already recognized the distance to the actual inflation estimated for 2021, which was then lower: 0.2 percent compared to a increase already set at 1.7% in a normal phase Prices not so hectic yet. Funds that would have had to go to interested parties anyway, and therefore from an accounting point of view, were simply advanced.
THE SIGNALS
The line of Meloni government is to closely monitor inflation developments in the first few months of the year. Of course, it is to be hoped that signs of a slowdown will solidify. The forecast on which the update of the economic and financial document is based envisages an average consumer price index growth of 5.4 percent for this year. The follow-up effect of 2022 alone, again according to Istat estimates, swallows up almost all fluctuations: In short, these values would only be reached if the course of the year was flat (as a synthesis of the probable increases in the first few months and later decreases). However, should a situation of prolonged suffering for families arise, Palazzo Chigi and the Ministry of Economy will consider new interventions that, in the case of pensioners, could take the form of an early recovery from the excessive inflation of 2022.
Inflation, first deceleration: In December, the cost of living decelerates to 11.6%. 2022 the highest peak in forty years
THE INDEX
At the technical level, the index used to adjust pensions is not the index for the whole community (NIC) but the foi (“families of workers and employees” in the version without tobacco), whose final trend is around ten of days to be announced: The average should definitely settle at 8.1 or at most one decimal place below the Nic. Meanwhile, pensioners with gross amounts over 2,100 euros, i.e. four times the minimum INPS treatment, are still awaiting their adjustment for inflation, which is not recognized 100 percent but in decreasing percentages as income increases, with the higher (32 percent of the revaluation for checks over the 10-fold minimum, i.e. over EUR 5,250 gross per month). The “ladder” was changed during parliamentary scrutiny and this circumstance forced INPS to check the counting operations on the fly. Thus, the revaluation was recognized from January to the lowest pensions up to the limit of 2,100 euros gross per month, while for those with a higher amount the increase in the reduced version should arrive from February. The adjustment mechanism – stricter than what was in place before the budget law intervened – will apply for this year and also for 2024. In this way, the state budget will recover part of the enormous resources consumed by the need to deal with decided anomalies inflation compared to previous years.
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