Of the five regional governments that will not meet their deficit goals, Catalonia is the only region that is ready to take extra measures to do so. Valencia, Murcia, Andalusia and Baleares seem content with noncompliance. For its part, Catalonia plans to not pay bonuses to its government employees this year.
Economic advisor Mas Colell has rightly criticized Montoro has not provided a good example to follow because there is a chance that he will decide to keep the bonus payment for national government workers.
Budget changes in Catalonia, unlike the tax cuts that the national government is imposing, also include some tax increases. But this strategy is unlikely to increase overall tax revenues.
Worse, the rest of the regions that are not meeting their deficit goals have the attitude that they can just wait for the economy to recover on its own before their budgets will balance.