Malta’s Economy: the Good, the Bad and the Uncertain

Labour is riding a wave of economic growth, but what lies behind this economic success and what is in store for Malta’s economy in the future? What is happening on the ground and what do the numbers really tell us?

by Mark Camilleri

Collage by the IotL Magazine

 

[dropcap]F[/dropcap]rom 2013 to 2017, Malta’s GDP grew by an average of 6.8 per cent per year, an impressive sum considering the slow growth taking place in the EU across these years and the ensuing global economic and political challenges. Labour, aided by low oil prices, has managed to create an open, flexible and thriving business climate. Numbers don’t lie, and indeed it is true that—at face value—the economy is doing well. However, behind the numbers showing rapid economic growth, there are also other numbers that show deeply-embedded structural problems which could easily lead to social crisis.

 

The Recipe of Malta’s Economic Miracle

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat has successfully implemented a Third Way: centrist and post-Fordist economic model by theoretically bringing an economic compromise between the interests of one economic class and the others. The main principles of this economic model are industrial peace, a welfare system that provides the essential layers of protection to the vulnerable sections of society, and a free market that is freely accessible to all businesses and individuals.

Muscat has implemented his vision in practice in a multi-pronged manner with the underlying principle of prioritising an increase in expenditure through the market.

Income tax has been progressively reduced, except for the top income bracket, inducing in turn higher expenditure levels in the economy. Red-tape and bureaucracy for businesses have been reduced to a great extent, while regulations for construction industry have been reduced drastically, thus allowing a construction boom that seems to have no end in sight.

 

 

More foreign companies and workers have relocated to Malta and have significantly contributed to the increase of government’s taxation revenue by 32 per cent in 2016 compared to its 2013 level. Economic growth was registered mostly in the services sector, but the construction industry—which now compromises 4 per cent of GDP—and the real-estate industry—comprising of 5 per cent of GDP—also grew substantially. In 2017 alone 8,513 apartments were built as opposed to the 2062 apartments built in 2013. The gaming industry, which currently comprises 12 per cent of GDP at around €1.2 billion in nominal terms, registered sustained growth along the years along with the tourism at 6.1 per cent of GDP and retail and catering at 21 per cent of GDP.

Agriculture and industrial production in electronic components and pharmaceuticals have kept their long-term decline.

Expenditure in the welfare state has increased considerably with recurrent expenditure on health and education in 2019 to amount at an average of 59 per cent higher than 2013 levels. The education system has been revamped and the health sector has been improved, drastically cutting waiting lists across all its services. Free childcare was also introduced and energy prices have been lowered compared to pre-2013 levels. Government has also exponentially increased its spending on culture and the arts. Unemployment rate in 2018 stood at 3.8 per cent.

 

Achievements Overshadowed by Corruption Scandals

Structural changes in the energy sector also heavily affected the economy and these should be taken into account. Enemalta, which was entering bankruptcy territory in 2013, had been bailed out with a Chinese investment in exchange for a minority stake in the company, while a new gas-powered plant was built to diversify energy supply, and contribute to long-term security and lower prices.

However, the gas deal was overshadowed by a corruption scandal in which ex-Minister for Energy Konrad Mizzi and Prime Minister’s Chief of Staff Keith Schembri were alleged to take kickbacks via 17Black, a company owned by Tumas Group CEO and Electrogas Director Yorgen Fenech (Electrogas is the consortium which owns and supplies the gas-fired plant in Delimara). The allegations have been recently backed up by emails from  Nexia BT—the accountants of Mizzi and Schembri who opened shell-companies in Panama for their clients—that state that Mizzi and Schembri were to receive a million euros each via 17Black.

 

The corruption scandal has averted public attention from a significant structural adjustment to the economy that helped to boost growth: government has no longer restricted large capital projects to particular Maltese oligarchs. Labour has opened up government procurement and no longer was bound to systematic preferential treatment of a number of Maltese oligarchs, which was the order of the day during the previous administration.

Preferential treatment has also been wavered when it comes to permits and government deals. This is also the reason why Muscat keeps receiving strong support from a middle-class base, which traditionally had been PN, and why he is perceived to have opened the economy to all. This doesn’t mean that Labour is not using its power of incumbency to provide preferential treatment to some of its supporters. Nepotism and preferential treatment do not appear to have been eradicated. What Muscat has changed was the rigid system geared in favour of particular oligarchs through government bureaucracy and State structures.

 

 

While trying to appease most of the big businesses by allowing them to expand their projects and giving them even more land deals, Muscat is, at the same time, letting smaller competitors to access government deals and procurement. Muscat has perfectly projected himself as a leader who allows open and accessible business to all: to oligarchs and small-businesses alike.

The structural government system of preferential treatment under PN had produced local oligarchs at the expense of public property and assets, and it was part of a broader raison d’être in how the economy was run: by basically sustaining a debt-ridden government by selling off state assets.

Muscat also ended the State fire-sale policy, but the 30-year concession to St. Luke’s, Karen Grech, and Gozo Hospital to a private company by then Minister of Health, Konrad Mizzi, had opened the government to accusations it intended to privatise the health sector.

Mizzi’s successor as health minister, Chris Fearne, has so far refused to entertain the idea of further private concessions in the health sector and instead focused on ramping up the budget for public health. It must yet be seen what Fearne’s long-term plans for the health-sector are, but his recent meetings with local magnate Żaren Vassallo may also indicate that Fearne could be planning further public-private partnerships in the health sector.

On the other hand, Konrad Mizzi, who is now Minister of Tourism, has refused to sell the national airline and is making efforts to salvage it after years of malpractice under PN governments. Government has also purchased 49 per cent of Lombard Bank and increased its share-holding in Bank of Valletta with capital raised from passport sales, practically going against the fire-sale trend of public-assets unless one would consider Konrad Mizzi’s foray into the health sector.

When Labour entered office in 2013, it inherited a heavily indebted State-energy company and a heavily indebted government with a stagnant economy. The layers of security to Malta’s debt are multifaceted, but the main layer of defence is the fact that public debt is held through bonds, most of which are locally owned.

A strong home ownership rate along with a cheap housing market had also enabled people to survive the recession of 2009, while local banks were not exposed to risk and had ample assets at their disposal. Labour has managed to begin reducing the deficit, while the debt to GDP ratio has decreased significantly from 68.7 in 2013 to 50.8 in 2017. This decrease is owed to the strong increase in government’s recurrent revenue, but, at the moment, government also has the comfort of sponsoring large chunks of capital projects—especially infrastructural projects with money made from passport sales.

Government debt in 2013 was calculated at €5 billion and in September 2017 debt was calculated at €5.8 billion. While government revenue and expenditure in 2013 was €3 billion and €3.2 billion respectively, in 2017 they were €4.3 billion and €4.1 billion, thus producing enough surplus to start repaying debt (different datasets may give different figures, but are all consistent with a significant surplus).

 

Planning for the Future

The figures above tell a story of a strong and growing economy, although some might still be concerned about debt levels. Austerity policies would not solve the public debt problem, and they would in turn create a social crisis. Thus, government needs to ensure that the economy keeps growing so as to sustain its increasing revenue levels, yet this could only be possible if the economy sustains consistent growth levels.

 

 

In textbook economics, a sustained economic growth without slumps is the exception rather than the rule, and thus government should seek to minimise its risks by diversification while simultaneously emphasising and prioritising economic growth, which is sustained by productive rather than speculative forces (that are more prone to risk). Currently, the government is ignoring the social and economic risks that emerge with growth through speculative forces. One should also not ignore the plausible economic problems brought by corruption practices—factual or perceived —and government-led private-public deals which give low public returns. Thus, auditing and transparent practices are also essential guardians of prosperity.

Government has been wise enough to build a symbiotic relationship with the gaming industry, through a legal regime that enables it to operate efficiently and competitively. Government has favoured the construction and real-estate industries, which have had their profits increase exponentially at a large social and environmental cost, and minimal economic return compared to other industries. And as the construction industry is going in overdrive, one would naturally assume the property prices would be also increasing. Here we find the seeds of an incoming social crisis.

 

Wages in Malta have increased by an average of 20 per cent in five years. From an average wage of €1,600 in 2013, the average wage today has risen to €1,800. The minimum wage has risen from €648 in 2013 to €747 in 2018, but the value of property, compared to its 2013 level, has increased by 100 per cent in most areas, with some areas even increasing at higher levels. According to NSO statistics, by 2016 in order to purchase a property in the cheapest areas, one had to be on an income of at least €20,000—even higher than the national average.

Government has so far refused to consider the option of price controls in the rental market, but it has begun preparations for the construction of social housing units and aims to introduce a basic regulatory framework in the rental market.

 

 

Ideally, social housing should go to those who needs it most, prioritising pensioners, retirees, people with disabilities, victims of domestic abuse and single parents in the low-income brackets. Still, social housing units may not even be sufficient to cater for all low-income earners. Even the average wage by itself is not enough to purchase a property, hence condemning single people with an average wage to remain in the rental market.

Although property prices may not increase as much as they did between 2014 and 2017, the ever-increasing demand for property in Malta and the lack of land ensures that property prices may very well keep increasing. Moreover, if the economy intends to keep growing in the services and tourism industries, a sustained increase in foreign workers and property buyers attracted through the said industries will only contribute to higher demand in property. At the same time, government has to ensure that the value of property doesn’t compromise the competitiveness of foreign businesses in Malta. The price of property was, for example, one of the factors which had incentivised many companies and hedge funds to move from London to Malta.

The main factor that has so far averted a housing crisis is the very high rate of home-ownership—78 per cent—but, at current inflation levels, there is a long-term uncertainty to whether the children of home-owning parents will be able to use their parents’ capital to become home-owners as well. In the long-term, the current discrepancy between the average wage and the property value will contribute to a situation where tomorrow’s families will be, on average, less rich than their peers in real terms.

 

 

Government has done well by reverting previous austerity policies and increasing the contribution to the welfare state, but it is also clear that a large section of the population, composed of low-income earners and pensioners are at serious risk of poverty.

Further discussion on Malta’s economic model is needed to ensure that we have an economic plan that works for all and not just for the few. After all, Labour should pursue its economic policy in line with its traditional principles of social justice. The main principle that should be at the heart of Labour’s economic policy is that economic growth should be an end to social and economic emancipation and not strictly an end to private profits. If Labour tips the balance in favour of social justice, it can legitimately claim to be left-wing.

Statistics sourced from Central Bank of Malta, National Statistics Office and Ministry of Finance.

Mark Camilleri is a historian and the executive chairman of the National Book Council. He has published a Marxist history of Malta in series called A Materialist Revision of Maltese History.