Governments change, but budgets remain. They remain the same: a hodgepodge of cuts and incentives of various kinds, mostly for production, designed to meet the parameters of European austerity and maintain the political, institutional, and economic-social framework. Anyone who still thinks that the budget law can achieve a more equitable distribution of resources should accept it. There are other paths to follow to begin reducing the inequality that scandalizes everyone, but only in words.
Thus, displaying the usual charade, the parliamentary majority and opposition retort with all the prepackaged language they've been repeating for decades, consisting of small-scale agitations and minor media and parliamentary upheavals that, nevertheless, will continue to worsen the living conditions of millions of people and ensure the economic and political elites' continued control over society.
The tried-and-tested pattern repeats itself mechanically. If there are resources to be raised, then education, healthcare, and pensions are prime hunting grounds for dredging up the resources to fuel the arms industry, major projects, and permanently struggling industrialists, and to provide a welcome treat to this or that sector or category. In detail, as most commentators have recognized, the budget is a carbon copy of last year's, which already bore the Draghi stamp. Incidentally, it can be noted that this economic foresight, within the context of cutting social spending, by the Meloni government is greatly appreciated by the European and Italian establishment. Now, aside from the additional EUR2 billion in funding for the Strait of Messina bridge project, particularly sought after by Salvini's League, there has been a significant increase in military spending of EUR2 billion, for a total annual expenditure of EUR32 billion, of which EUR13 billion is for new armaments. As one of our distinguished, long-standing politicians, the Honorable Gasparri, proudly stated, declaring that if we want full granaries, we need to fill the arsenals. This shows a certain attention to the good things of the past: granaries! Healthcare, education, and pensions are suffering more or less disguised cuts and still have absolutely insufficient resources to adequately address their obligations. Regarding pensions, however, the government can boast of having increased the minimum pension-never mind if it's just three euros a month! But the solution is ready: push, as everyone has been doing for years, for supplementary pensions. In fact, a Northern League amendment establishes that one can retire at 64 if one is in the contributory system and if, by combining mandatory and supplementary pensions, one reaches a pension three times higher than the minimum, around 1,700 euros: insurance companies and pension funds are grateful. After all, banks and insurance companies must be treated with respect; woe betide anyone who talks about taxation, they are politely asked. An article in Il Sole 24 Ore on December 23 announced the measures, which have been discussed for months, as follows: "The voluntary contribution to public coffers by banks and insurance companies, as envisaged in the budget, has increased over the past few months and amounts to EUR6.5 billion. The prospect of advancing liquidity to the State has been accepted by the sector given the possibility of recovering the funds in subsequent years. Essentially, it is an interest-free loan."
The fact that our tax system, in defiance of the usual Constitution, is shamelessly regressive no longer seems to shock anyone. Starting this year, the mechanism of only three tax rates has been established: 23% for incomes up to EUR28,000, 35% up to EUR50,000, and 43% for incomes above EUR50,000. It would be interesting to look at the historical series of tax rates from 1974 to today to understand how direct taxation has become increasingly favorable to the wealthy and penalizing the poorest. In fact, if in the second half of the 1970s there was a high and diversified number of tax brackets and the highest incomes were taxed up to 72%, to then drop to around 65% in the 1980s, in the years that followed up to today the rates have decreased, compacting the taxation downwards to the current 43% for incomes, as we have seen, over 50 thousand euros[1]. A real robbery to the detriment of the middle and lower classes.
Amid the futile bickering over the budget, the social and economic picture is more dramatic than ever: soaring inequality (see the data collected annually by Oxfam); exponential growth in poverty (nearly six million people live in absolute poverty, 10% of the population); increasingly precarious and poorly paid jobs (which statistics disguise as increased employment, much to the delight of government officials); modest, if not imperceptible, GDP growth (despite the devastation and inequality wrought by the "religion of growth").
As has been the case every year for a long time, the "Sbilanciamoci!" (Let's Get Off Balance!) campaign is drafting a counter-budget diametrically opposed to that of the various governments in office. This year's budget, as summarized on their website, is "a zero-balance economic and financial counter-budget, with 102 proposals totaling over EUR54 billion to ensure justice, well-being, and sustainability for the country." These are perfectly common-sense proposals that divert resources from harmful things-wars, weapons, major projects, polluting industries-and divert them to services like schools, healthcare, pensions, while introducing modestly progressive taxes. Yet no government, right-wing or center-left, has ever taken this into account. Is there an answer to such deafness? It would be rather obvious to say that the reason is simple: the lack of a real and determined social mobilization that could force governments to change their political direction. But in times of calm and social resignation, everything seems beyond our strength, and it's not enough, as some have done, to raise the empty specter of revolt, emulating the verbose propaganda of maximalists of another era. If, then, we've reached this point, perhaps it might be more useful to reconnect the threads of a grassroots discourse that upholds certain principles: direct action by the lower classes, coherence between means and ends, autonomy of struggles: no compromise, no compromise.
https://www.sicilialibertaria.it/2026/02/05/il-rito-della-finanziaria/
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