Governments measure during the COVID crisis and statistical implications in national accounts: The case of tax deferrals1

During the COVID-19 crisis many European governments have implemented major policy measures to support companies and households coping with the sharp decline in economic activity. Correctly interpreting and recording these measures in the national accounts was a major challenge for compilers who had to ensure not only timely but also independent, reliable, and comparable statistics in exceptional circumstances. High quality official statistics are fundamental for public finance monitoring, both at quarterly and at annual level. They provide informative basis for policy makers and economic analysts and play a central role in the context of the European fiscal surveillance process. This paper discusses how the Italian Statistical institute (ISTAT) managed to quickly respond to the sudden increase in the need for public finance information in the aftermath of government interventions to contrast the consequences of COVID-19 crisis. In particular, the paper focuses on one of the first fiscal actions Italian government enforced immediately following the outbreak that is deferrals of tax obligations. According to OECD (2021) this is the main fiscal relief European countries have introduced in response to Covid crisis. The urgency of giving appropriate trace of these actions in the framework of national accounts has raised a significant methodological issue for compilers, and its solution can be exemplary of an innovative approach to provide data during extraordinary periods remaining as compliant as possible with the conventional processes and codified rules. The approach is based on the combination of new data sources with already existing data, on a strengthen interaction among data providers and government agencies to assure a speedier access to administrative data (Ministry of Finance and Revenue Agency), and on a strict collaboration with European institutions (Eurostat).