Campaigning for the upcoming early parliamentary elections at the end of the month is in full swing. All 13 parties, nine coalitions and 21 initiative committees with independent candidates for MPs compete to win the trust of voters with promises for good things coming. Bulgarians are very sensitive when it comes to their wallets and the economic and social platforms of candidate MPs.

And they have every reason to pay particular attention to the economic aspects of election programs, as one third of people live on incomes below the subsistence minimum, while over 50 percent consider themselves poor and all those people have long been waiting to live with decent European income. Isn’t the government responsible for this? Of course, living standards are not always dependent on government policy, but this does not matter much to ordinary voters who are convinced that no one else except the government could solve their problems.

The general impression created by economic platforms is that they were not very competently written. They are superficial, but they are up to date and in line with the global political trend - populism.

Until recently the government relied on restrictive financial policy and on financing of major infrastructure projects. Now things are changing and major investments go towards the economic problems of the individual. It's all about income - salaries, pensions, social benefits. Every party or coalition now focuses on incomes. Some vow that at the end of their mandate the average monthly salary in the country would reach 750 euros from the current level of 500 euros and the minimum salary would rise to reach 330 euros from the current level of 230 euros. Others promise that there would be no Bulgarians living below the poverty line /155 euros a month/. Some say that if they ruled the country, incomes would rise by 50 percent in the next 4 years. How would that happen? This is a mystery or just vague phrases. This will not happen by raising taxes, since all agree that taxes should be kept at the same level. Perhaps incomes will rise thanks to high economic growth, which is present in the documents of all candidates for MPs. But here again there are no details explaining how the steady GDP growth would be achieved. Some say that one of the means is fight against corruption and grey economy. Well, this would not be enough for raising national and personal wealth.

In pre-election socio-economic programs problems such as inflation, external debt, foreign investments, balance of payments, foreign trade, etc. are missing or are rarely mentioned. However, this is understandable, as these pre-election programs are not designed for expert economists but for the wider audience. So realistically speaking, they do not give a completely accurate picture of what kind of policy would be led or whether promises would be kept.

English: Alexander Markov