“We need Chile Vamos to open up to solidarity”

The economist and director of Public Space, Eduardo Engelsaid that regarding the reform of the pension system, the right has to open itself to solidarity.

“What we need is better pensions and more solidarity and these two issues do not have to come into contradiction. Progress can be made in both dimensions, which is a bit of what I try to raise in my column, that it is important that Chile Vamos be “open, that there is an element of solidarity in an issue in which the government has given up a lot,” he said in conversation with Al Pan Pan con Mirna Schindler.

In that sense, he explained that the Executive “started with a proposal in which it was 6-0, in which 6 went to social security, to solidarity and there was nothing for individual accounts and has been yielding to a 3-3. On the opposition side, so far at least, has not given in the slightest and continues to insist that it be 0-6, that everything goes to individual accounts. It should also be noted that there has been a suboptimal job on the part of the government in explaining the elements of solidarity.”

When asked if it was actually a better policy for that 6% to go entirely to individual accounts, Engel said he did not “agree with that statement, I think it is not good economics. I also believe that there are economists and also transversal parliamentarians, including on the right, who also realize that this is a position from which they can leave and take a more intermediate position. I think that this extreme position is very easy to communicate. There are groups that totally believe it, but there are people who realize that this is a position in which they must be willing to give in and reach an agreement, which is a bit of what I argue in the column, that Chile Vamos is missing an opportunity by demanding that 6% go exclusively to individual accounts.”

At this point, he says that the right is playing with the electoral calculations, where they believe they will win the next presidential election. “What I make them see is that nothing is certain, there have been several in recent years who believed the same, that they had everything won and ended up regretting not having been a little more measured in what they tried to do and exactly what could happen to them.” the same”.

In his opinion, the right has to start negotiating “at this moment a reform and that has negotiating power like the right has not had in the last decade, “We have to wait for a potential, eventual, even better negotiating position in a next government, which does not have to materialize, especially given that the economy is improving.”