Bloomberg on Monday reported that the EU Commission is considering a request, towards the Tsipras government, for stepped up implementation of austerity measures originally set for implementation in 2020, namely, a reduction in the tax-free annual income threshold in 2019.
The news agency cites the draft of a compliance report for Greece as the basis for its report.
Along those lines, such a prospect will come in case the IMF and European creditors consider that Greece cannot achieve a 3.5 percent primary budget surplus in 2019, as a percentage of GDP, something the leftist-rightist coalition government acquiesced in the summer of 2015, after backing down in negotiations with creditors.
Additionally, the Commission report said Greece authorities must ensure that a lower VAT rate for a handful of eastern Aegean islands bearing the brunt of the Third World migrant / Mideast refugee flows must be harmonized with the rest of Greece by June 2018 – the deadline already cited by the Tsipras government.
The government has been loathed to implement remaining austerity measures in 2019, the year when regular elections will take place, preferring 2020.
