Chile: Progressive policy creep

CHILE - In Brief 18 Mar 2024 by Robert Funk

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It seems that Boric has stopped trying to appeal to the center. His popularity—forever stuck in the 25-30% range—is unlikely to rise, or fall. Looking ahead, Boric told his cabinet, “In the remaining two years of government, (we need) not to make promises, (but) to fulfill them.” Boric, like most presidents, came to office promising change. But his change would be different: not only did he offer different policies, but in the words of former minister Giorgio Jackson, a different “scale of values and principles” from the previous generation. As he said on election night, Boric came with a long list of issues to fix, including health care, pensions, education, distribution of wealth, better wages, public security, “promoting science” and “leaving behind the patriarchal legacy of our society”. And then there was the constitutional process. Two years is not enough time to judge, but it seems fair to observe that the Boric government does not have many of these boxes ticked off. It did manage to get legislation passed to implement a 40-hour work week, to increase the minimum wage and to pass the mining royalty. But Boric came to office on the tails of a national protest movement that had its sights set on healthcare, pensions and education—and eventually a new constitution. None of these things have seen much improvement. Boric still may get some kind of pension reform passed, but even if he does, it will not represent systemic change. He would get a top-up of 6% in contributions, with a bit more money going to the universal public system: in other words, not too different from what President Piñera proposed. On health care, the situation is even more dire than it was on e...