There’s some good news to report in today’s paper, starting with the draft 2019 budget being back on track. A new version is to be submitted in accordance with advice of the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT to reduce proposed expenditures from NAf. 503 million to NAf. 475 million.
Of course, that means government will be able to spend NAf. 28 million less than hoped, but at least the process to establish a budget can continue going into the second month of the year, with another exemption allowing for a deficit due to the devastation inflicted by Hurricanes Irma and Maria in September 2017. Loans for capital expenses are to be limited to NAf. 40 million, but that’s still significantly above what was available in 2018.
Also positive is the signing of a contract for US $550,000 to repair homes that fall under St. Maarten Housing Development Foundation (SMHDF). The money coming from the Dutch-sponsored Trust Fund will be used to fix more than 100 roofs and ceilings, as well as more complicated work on a smaller number of badly damaged units.
But perhaps most welcome, certainly for those directly involved, was the announcement that the AOV/AWW pensions will be indexed by 2.71 per cent effective January 1 after all. Despite the lack of a new consumer price index (CPI) for technical reasons, this was done particularly on behalf of senior citizens who depend on such, especially as they received no cost-of-living adjustment in 2018 as a result of the hurricanes’ impact.
The old, unused CPI, plus figures of the Central Bank of Curaçao and St. Maarten (CBCS), warranted the legally-required indexation. One reader noted that this would add only NAf. 16 per month, but one should keep in mind that it’s not a salary hike, but rather an inflation correction.
On the full old age pension of NAf. 1,068, as recently stated in Parliament, based on information from two years ago the additional amount would be NAf. 29.41. However, because of the many residents who did not spend their entire lives on the island, the average AOV/AWW pay-out was said to be NAf. 650, which translates to an increase of NAf. 17.61.
For argument’s sake, applying the same percentage to the monthly minimum wage of NAf. 1,516 would raise it by just NAf. 41.08. While even that may be undesirable under the current economic circumstances, it would not seem to be the end of the world either.
