Ignoring the warning of the Ministry of Finance, the government, as always, guided by political expediency, decided to increase pensions.

The increase of pensions, no matter how much it is necessary, is not provided with financial means, because from the beginning the government did not allocate money for it in the state budget. They raised it on assumptions. One thing that has worried the Ministry of Finance in terms of what these expenses will be paid for. Especially since we are talking about quite serious money.

According to the government’s calculations, almost 79 billion drams are needed to increase pensions and benefits. After approving the budget, that amount was not included in the expenses. In accordance with the projected incomes of the budget, they set the expenses, which, however, do not include the 79 billion drams needed for raising pensions.

Based on that, the Ministry of Finance has warned that in this way they are creating risks for the budgets of this and future years.

“Taking into account the political and social resonance of the presented proposal, nevertheless, from the point of view of fiscal stability, we consider it necessary to note that in this case it refers to 2026. and about the significant increase in current expenses for the following years, which will lead to significant inertial increases in the social expenses of the base budget in the following years and will significantly limit the opportunities of the RA government to spend in other directions.

If we add to the latter the existing fiscal restrictions, as well as significant fiscal pressures on current expenses arising from the universal health insurance system and additional spending needs generated in many other directions in 2026. and for the following years, we consider the presented proposal to be quite risky,” the Ministry of Finance had warned about the government’s initiative to increase pensions, but the government ignored that warning.

Meanwhile, the risks related to fiscal stability mean that the budget may face problems in servicing these expenses, because the financial sources that will be used to pay for the increase in pensions are not known. Especially, the hasty introduction of health insurance increased the burden on the budget. Budgetary funds intended for that purpose may run out in the middle of the year, as was usually the case with state orders, and additional funds may be needed. It is not known where the money will be taken from.

It was not enough, without financial security, they decided to increase pensions and add a completely new burden to the budget. The risk of losing power forced them to take that step, and now, in hindsight, they have started looking for funds to pay the pensions.

They say that we have additional expectations of tax revenues. The question arises, if there were such expectations, why were they not included in the state budget approved just a few months ago?

There are 2 options: those expectations are false and unfounded, or they were deliberately hidden at the time.

The most likely thing is that there were no such expectations, they could not have arisen in such a short time. Just before the elections, they decided to create false grounds for raising pensions.

What will they do if those expectations do not come true tomorrow? At the moment, there is no reason to claim that the budget revenues will be more than planned and that they will cover the costs of raising pensions.

The other question is what will happen if these revenues are not received, should we say that the increase of pensions should be done retrospectively?

Naturally, until the elections do something, they will cut money here and there to cover the costs of raising pensions. After the elections, the risks that the budget may face with servicing the entire financial burden are quite real. And at that time, both the payment of pensions and the fulfillment of other budget expenses will become problematic.

It is an adventure to put the budget in front of such danger for political purposes. But it is not for today’s rulers of Armenia.

Without grounds and justifications, they claim that 40 billion of the 79 billion necessary for increasing pensions will be filled at the expense of additional taxes from the budget. Where did they get that the tax revenues of the approved budget will exceed by 40 billion? Nikol Pashinyan is so entangled in his lies that he makes blatantly false statements at the government meeting. He says that last year we collected 30 billion drams more tax revenue than planned, and none of the members of the government dares to correct his “innocent” mistake. According to last year’s approved budget, they planned to collect 2 trillion 720 billion drams, they collected 2 trillion 725 billion in taxes. They didn’t make a single 30 billion overdraft. Where did he get that the tax revenues of the budget exceeded by 30 billion last year?

With such false justifications, they cherish the hope that this year they will collect at least 40 billion drams more in taxes than planned and with that amount they will cover half of the costs of increasing pensions. The first 2 months of the tax year are already in the past and the taxes collected in those months do not give such grounds at all. What’s more, in the near future, both economic and budgetary problems may worsen due to regional instability and the expected activation of internal political processes in Armenia.

They intend to take the other half of the money needed for increasing pensions from the reserve fund. They forgot what the reserve fund is for.

The reserve fund is for stabilizing the country’s economic and financial situation in case of force majeure. And what are the current rulers of Armenia doing? They are trying to solve their political and reproduction problems with the reserve fund money, ignoring possible future dangers.

HAKOB KOCHARYAN

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