Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki participated today in a panel titled “The New Impetus for Europe” at the World Economic Forum in Davos. During the panel, the issue of EU-U.S. relations came up and the Polish Prime Minister was adamant about Poland not having to chose between one or the other.
Prime Minister Morawiecki started out by saying that the conservative Polish government has succeeded in combining two very important polices. The first deals with the economy as the Prime Minister said that GDP growth has been very high and that budget deficit is so minuscule that it’s practically at zero.
Both statements are accurate as Poland’s GDP growth is currently at 5%, the best result in all of Europe. The Minister of Finance, Teresa Czerwińska, recently announced that according to inofficial figures, the deficit in 2018 will amount to around 10 billion Zloty, that’s about one fourth less than the government forecasted for its 2018 budget. Taking into account to swifth economic growth, the small deficit actually means that Polish public debt to GDP ratio is decreasing and has now reached below 50% for the first time since 2009.
The accomplishment to decrease the public debt to GDP ratio is impressive when taking into account that the government has spent a lot of money on the second policy field mentioned in the beginning of this article, namely social politics.
Soon after being elected, or more precisely in April 2016, the conservative government launched a programme called “Family 500 Plus” with the aim to increase birth-rates and to decrease the levels of child poverty, especially of children raised in large families. 500 Zloty, or around 135 dollars, for every second and additional child are given to their parents. All parents are qualified for the extra money as it is not dependent on the income levels of the parents.
Prime Minister Morawiecki finished his speech by talking about Poland’s role in international politics. According to the Prime Minister, Poland is very pro-European Union at the same time as it is staunchly pro-American. He also underlined that Poland is one of few European countries to hold these two positions simultaneously.
As a result, Poland is in a position to serve as the bridge between the EU and the U.S. particularly now as relations have been strained following hints of a trade war between between the two parties as well as harsher rhetoric used by leaders on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.