Public finance 

Polish party leaders are forced by media to specify the costs of their election promises. A decade ago no one bothered. Polish democracy is maturing.

Polish policymakers have to face indirect costs of a healthcare system and implement reforms. But so far all arguments have been consistently ignored by the Ministry of Health officials, at least officially.

30,000 companies in Poland pay a total of PLN 3bn in additional taxes for employment of disable, but the majority of disabled people are not looking for an employment.

The Polish government is not the most lavish one as far as attracting FDI is concerned. According to the latest report by the Polish Foreign Investment Agency, Poland has less incentives than Bulgaria and the Czech Republic but more than Slovakia or Romania.

Our business is not to buy investments but to shape an economic map of Poland. CEFinancialObserver.eu talks to Sławomir Majman, President of the Polish Information and Foreign Investment Agency.

Special economic zones are beneficial for regions that are at intermediate stages of development. In most cases they have not added to the growth of local communities.

A stagnant European Union and growing geopolitical problems in Russia are forcing Poland to look further afield for export markets, with some success; the government’s two-year-old GoAfrica programme has boosted trade with Africa by 25%.

There are more than 115 million immigrants currently living in developed countries of the OECD - people born outside their current country of residence who hold citizenship of the country of their origin. They constitute approx. 10% of the population in the OECD.

At least 70 cities and municipalities have already launched their participatory budgets. Their number will grow since they are drivers of popularity and the local elections are scheduled as early as this autumn. Therefore, once again - after a year - we are watching the implementation of the idea of the participatory budget. A review of Internet reports shows that the process of creating participatory budgets has been professionalised by city authorities.

The number of children and youth is for the first time the same as the number of pensioners in Poland. Both groups were 7 million strong in December 2013, according the preliminary reports of Poland’s Central Statistics Agency. This was also the first year in which the Polish government withdrew more from the its Demographic Reserve Fund (FRD), created as a reserve in case of problems with future pension payments, than it paid into the fund from gains from privatization. The fund is dwindling.