Portrait of Serge Gaillard – From an enemy of the state to StarbeamtenEr was on the verge of Pension. Then the Corona came and made the financial Manager to one of the most powerful Swiss officials. While bourgeois politicians had tried to stop his career.Christoph Lenz0 comments”these are Exciting questions and choices”: Serge Gaillard, in a sessional hall of the Swiss Federal Department of Finance. Photo: Raphael Moser
It’s a bit like in those American movies. The old warhorse is already on the way to retirement, when suddenly Chaos erupts. Because he has to, once again, ran. For the last Time to save the world.
Serge Gaillard, of the will in July, 65 years old, could have been the most successful Federal Finance administrators of the post-war history. Since 2012, he controls the Federal Treasury. There were eight Golden years. Below the line, Gaillard has retracted Surplus of almost CHF 15 billion. A multiple of its predecessor.
But then came Corona. And now everything is different. If Serge Gaillard is the beginning of 2021 in Board, he will present to the completion of a record deficit. Loss: somewhere between 30 and 40 billion Swiss francs. The beautiful personal balance sheet: gone.
Rankles him? “Not really,” said Serge Gaillard, who has taken only reluctantly time for a conversation. The current Situation confirm only that the debt in good times would have to be dismantled, because it always come back to crises with a strong debt increase. He would have wished for a quieter last year? “On the contrary”, says Gaillard. “There are never so many exciting questions and decisions, such as in a crisis.”
in other words, never has so much Power.
He led the Federal Council of the Hand,
The Corona-aid package for the economy has many mothers and fathers. But only one Person spoke virtually anywhere, to sit at the table, if in the Federal administration principle were decisions or detail questions of a clarification needed: Serge Gaillard.
This is what makes him special. As the Federal Council was in March Anzhi, with dozens of measures and billions of francs, the most severe economic shock since almost fifty years, cushion, led Gaillard his Hand.
This person tells a lot about the recent history of the Switzerland. For example, the career of a political idea: Since his first public appearances as a Central Secretary of the Swiss Federation of trade unions Gaillard is of the opinion that the state needs to open up during economic crises, the monetary floodgates in order to stabilize the demand and to overcome the recessive phase.
In the Deregulation zeal of the nineties was Gaillard as ideologically confused theorists. He was a “fair-weather political economist,” mocked the “world week” in 1997. In the Corona-crisis Gaillard’s concepts have become, to a certain extent for reasons of state. Vigorously defended, even by fiscal hawks.
“Very intelligent”: SVP-financial politician Franz Grüter about Serge Gaillard.Photo: Alessandro della Valle (Keystone)
Serge Gaillard’ve made in the Corona-crisis a very good Job, says SVP-national Council Franz Grüter. He was “extremely competent, very intelligent, always objective and always up-to-date”.
Gaillard’s rise in the Federal government in Bern also shows how the civil, Switzerland has learned to deal with their left-wing Intellectuals for more relaxed. Fact is, that, in the same state, whose coffers Serge Gaillard, be on your guard today, tried in front of a good 35 years, still active, to stop the career of Gaillard. Several companions have described to this editorial for the first time.
Gilgen against Gaillard
After his Economics studies, Serge Gaillard, son of a Zurich middle-class family, in 1983, wanted to attach a doctor’s work. However, in the Canton of Zurich in the eighties, it was not easy for everyone, in the public service to enter. Gaillard felt direct reprisals. Because he had listened to in his youth by the Revolutionary Marxist League, intervened in the then state councillor Alfred Gilgen (LdU) is sharp, as the University of Zurich, Gaillard wanted to do. Gilgen wanted to forbid the University to give Gaillard a Job.
just Wanted to let Serge Gaillard’t take your doctorate: by The then Director of Education in Zurich by Alfred Gilgen. Photo: Keystone
As the University of the Director of Education, said that the personnel decisions of the policy dictate, they found a compromise. Gaillard received only a one-year contract. A condition for the continuation of the employment an annual report on Gaillard’s research activity was to behave. His Professor, Heidi Schelbert, had to vouch personally for councillor Gilgen for Gaillard at the University of no subversive activities.
in 1988, submitted a Serge Gaillard his doctoral thesis. They studied the influence of taxes on investment decisions of firms. It is – in Good times and in Bad – the opposite of a polemic.
Now, the new order
As he looks back on that time arises? It gives him satisfaction to be a decision maker in that state has become the enemy of was him in once place? Serge Gaillard does not want to speak to. It was an old story from a different world.
He was talking prefers, on the present.
The Corona-crisis a typical structural break: A new era has begun with the new political assumptions. In these weeks, this new order takes shape. Now who’s this, who’s with suggestions in Bern that can shape the Switzerland for the next ten or twenty years.
The best example: before the summer holidays, the Federal Council decides how he wants to repay the Corona-induced deficit of 30 to 40 billion Swiss francs. Within a few years, as required by the financial budget act and how it seeks to Finance Minister Ueli Maurer? Or only in the longer term, in order not to jeopardize the economic recovery by a too-harsh austerity course?
ers has with the debt?
It is a very technical question, but one with enormous consequences. Of your much depends extremely: whether the army can rebuild in ten years, your expensive floor systems (tanks). The expenditure for universities, farmers, and development assistance develop. And, not least, how high is the pressure to Reform the Social security system will be in the next few years.
Because the Federal Council is divided over the pace of debt reduction, the evaluation of the financial administrator Gaillard, a special weight. So, how the SP has it-a man with the state debt? In a relaxed manner, you might say. In history there have been periods in which the debt is enormously increased, says Gaillard. “In a crisis you can’t prevent the debt often at all. You would only cause damage.”
“politics has, unfortunately, been a tendency to spend a lot of money”: Serge Gaillard. Photo: Peter Klaunzer (Keystone)
At the same time, you can afford new debt only if you return then back to a solid financial policy. “I am convinced that it takes an expenditure rule for the budget. The policy has, unfortunately, been a tendency to spend a lot of money.”
And what he says to the pace of debt reduction? Quickly? Careful? Serge Gaillard, dispensed with an answer. Too delicate, so shortly before the Federal Council’s decision.
What to do in Bern with security knows, the SVP-man Franz Grüter says: “It is clear that Serge Gaillard will push up the debt reduction of his stamp. Maybe for the last Time.”
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