Articles by Fernando Gonzalez Urbaneja

About the Author

Fernando Gonzalez Urbaneja
Over 30 years working in economic journalism. Fernando was founder and chief-editor at El País, general editor at the business daily Cinco Días, and now teaches at Universidad Carlos III. He's been president of the Madrid Press Association and the Spanish Federation of Press Associations. He's also member of the Spanish press complaints commission.
noticias cara b TC

Block journalism in the mainstream media

Fernando González Urbaneja | The partiality of the so-called “mainstream media” when it comes to reporting (not giving opinions or editorialising) on the twists and turns and the ups and downs of political parties is disturbing. They have even lost the appearance of neutrality in their reporting in favour of a tiresome, one-sided view that goes so far as to distort the facts and even invent tensions. Thus, they are…


tunnel light end

Wide trains as a symptom

Fernando González Urbaneja | The case of the trains that do not fit in the tunnels is a significant anecdote both of a huge, astonishing error in design and commissioning, and of the absence of explanations and a coherent account of what happened. What we do know is confusing and the laments of the regional presidents affected are insufficient to understand the case. The comments from the ministry and ADIF…


escriva

Public administration does not work

Fernando González Urbaneja | Public systems are not working; waiting lists in hospitals are lengthening; primary care services are collapsing; and Social Security and SEPES offices are not responding… Miguel Valverde one of the best informed journalists on pensions and labour relations describes in Monday’s Expansión what he calls the “Colapso de la Seguridad Social”. It is impossible to get an appointment by telephone or in person. This has been…


pedro sanchez

A government opposed to employers and profits

Fernando González Urbaneja | This is nothing new. Placing successful entrepreneurs and corporate profits as targets of electoral political debate has been part of the agenda of more than a few political parties, especially the most extreme ones, both on the right and on the left. The novelty now in Spain is that the president of the government and of the socialist party is taking up this argument as one…


inflacion super

Price controls and old, failed ideas

Fernando González Urbaneja | Keynes in the closing pages of his “General Theory…” alludes to the failed ideas of old economists nesting in the minds of new rulers as one of the avoidable mistakes. Old ideas, simple answers to somewhat more complex problems are frequent in politics, due to inconsistency, prejudice, ignorance, lack of experience. The most blatant example is the price of the shopping basket, which has undergone appreciable…


Carstens

“We are facing a change of era rather than a change of cycle”

Fernando González Urbaneja & Luis Martí | Agustín Carstens, Managing Director of the Bank for International Settlements, Basel (BIS), explains that “I think this is a change of era. While it is true that it may coincide with a change of cycle, I believe we are facing a change of era for several reasons. There are structural factors that helped us during the last few years, since before the global…


SpainConstitucionalCourt

Separation of powers, what the hell is that (*)?

Fernando González Urbaneja | This is what the government spokeswoman might say now – what the hell is this separation of powers? – about the appointment of two members of the Constitutional Court, a government quota, in favour of two former high-ranking officials with direct socialist affiliation or sympathy. Minister Bolaños, who is dealing with the matter on behalf of and with the confidence of Prime Minister Sánchez, argues that…


Congreso

A Debased Parliamentarism

Fernando González Urbaneja | What has been heard these days (and others) in Parliament (Congress and Senate) would make you cry, it goes beyond bad manners and rudeness; fortunately they have only been words, although degenerating could go further. It has already happened in other parliaments and it happened in ours a little less than a century ago. It is unimaginable today what he called the dialectic of the pistols,…


pedro sanchez

The government’s arrogance towards the ECB

Fernando González Urbaneja | The ECB’s non-binding considerations on the “temporary levy on banks (an economic benefit that is not a tax) could have merited a silent response from the government, an “informed but not concerned” or something similar, but they have produced an irritation with disqualifications and scorn that can only be the result of irresistible arrogance. It is well known that this government, especially the president, does not…


Spanish public debt

Budget 23: Expansive And Electoral (What The Government Knows How To Do)

Fernando González Urbaneja | No surprise, the Budgets 2023 presented give everything the government has to offer; coherent with what has been presented so far in the legislature; no more (and no less). Expansionary and electoral budgets. As always, and even more so, since the aim is to win the elections themselves. And this is done with optimism, with generous distribution of benefits, without concern for deficit and debt. No…