Economics
Chile Eases Fiscal Stimulus, Delays Plan to Balance Budget
- Government proposes to raise spending by 4.4% next year
- Chile won't balance structural budget by 2018, Valdes says
This article is for subscribers only.
Chile’s government said it plans to slow spending growth next year, while admitting that a slump in copper prices and sluggish growth will force it to ditch plans to balance the budget by 2018.
Expenditure will rise 4.4 percent in 2016, compared with the 9.8 percent increase budgeted for this year, President Michelle Bachelet said in a televised address to the nation Wednesday. She didn’t give estimates for the budget deficit, which Finance Minister Rodrigo Valdes forecast will reach 3.3 percent of gross domestic product this year.