Business owners want more from Rajoy

Talking about Spain's economic outlook between 2017 and 2018 is risky whether you are the government or a business. Still, forecasts from both groups are interesting since they offer two possible yet opposite views of the near future.

In its latest Stability Program report, the government said that Spain would be depressingly similar to the way it is now in 2017. It expects the national debt to be 98.5% of GDP and the unemployment rate to be 19.8%. The Consejo Empresarial de Competitividad, a private business organization comprised of the 18 largest companies in Spain, hopes that unemployment will fall to 10.4% and the government will spend 30 billion euros less per year than it does now.

How can such different forecast coexist? Well, the private businesses factor in reforms to education, taxes, power and R&D. A recent annual survey from Empresa Familiar shows that private companies have outshined the government in their efforts to jumpstart the economy as the value of our economy rose from 2.2 to 4.26 points in only a year while the political rating level fell from 9 to 1.08.

The message from businesses to Rajoy is clear: there is a lot more work to do in the economy than fighting corruption. But this is the opposite path that the Prime Minister seems to be taking.