Today, Prime Minister Borissov announced a new package of economic measures to combat the crisis worth 2 billion leva, with a strong emphasis on higher healthcare spending and social spending for pensioners and the unemployed. Although these social measures are not particularly large-scale in themselves, they signal a very wrong approach …
More »Extending the state of emergency is not a wise idea
Yesterday (Wednesday, April 1) the government announced its desire to extend the state of emergency by another month until May 13. Alas, this was not an April Fool's joke. And judging by the statements made by government representatives, this means maintaining all currently in force quarantine and combat measures ...
More »Economic indicators - types and application
Most economists have opinions about what stage of the business cycle an economy is in. But if you haven't noticed, many of their predictions turn out to be wrong. For example, Ben Bernanke in 2007 (then chairman of the Federal Reserve) predicted that the US was not headed for a recession and that …
More »ECB: Raising the minimum wage leads to layoffs and higher prices
A European Central Bank[1] (ECB) survey of more than 8,079 companies from EU Member States in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE)[2] aims to understand how increases in minimum wages (MW) are affecting businesses in these countries. 456 Bulgarian companies were asked what …
More »How to create a good economic model?
Modern economists use a range of statistical methods, ranging from extremely complex ones to simple displays of historical data. It is generally accepted that through statistical correlation, historical data can be transformed into useful information, which in turn can serve as a basis for assessing the economy as a whole. Unfortunately, this …
More »How minimum insurance thresholds harm workers
Yesterday, the Minister of Labor and Social Policy Biser Petkov announced that the minimum social security income (MSI) for 2018 will be increased by 3.9%. Once again, such an increase in the social security thresholds is being undertaken with the explicit DISapproval of employers and even their refusal to participate in the negotiations for the determination of these …
More »The advantages and disadvantages of international trade
Author: Simona Zlatkova The purpose of this article is to analyze the publication “Indirect Damages” (ed.), published in the Economist magazine in July last year, and by building a comparison with the information provided by the US Chamber of Commerce a few months later, to build an argumentative structure that allows everyone to give their own answer to the ongoing …
More »Why are workers in the US against raising the minimum wage?
By John McDermott, MEL Magazine A few weeks ago, researchers at the University of Washington published a new study that found Seattle’s attempts to improve the economic prospects of the city’s working class have backfired. Seattle is one of many U.S. cities that are gradually raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour in …
More »Commissioned science, economic principles and the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
At the very end of last week, the results of a study commissioned by the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy and conducted by the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences were published, which concluded that: "Minimum social security income (MSI) and the minimum wage (MW) do not negatively affect employment and do not reduce it." These are ...
More »Policy to increase youth unemployment
In the middle of this week, the parliament adopted on second reading the amendments to the Labor Code regulating internships and legal relations between employers and interns studying with them. The amendments to the law aim to increase youth employment and improve the labor market. According to the new regulations, interns up to 29 years of age, …
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