What the Budget Doesn't Say

While discussions on the 2024 Central Government Budget Law continue in the Turkish Grand National Assembly, interpreting what the budget figures tell us about the future can give us an idea about public policy. However, a friend of mine who read my article "What the Budget Says" asked me, "So, what does the budget not say?" he asked a question. This question had a different impact on me. Our perceptions can detect a certain dimension of reality. It is almost impossible to see all dimensions. For this reason, the accuracy of weather forecast reports decreases as the maturity increases. Since it is not possible to take every detail into account even in the most perfect modeling, there may be large deviations in weekly forecasts. Although it is possible to understand what the government plans in the future from budget figures, it may not be easy to predict all the consequences of public policy.

Although it is somewhat easy to answer what is, it is not so easy to answer what is not. But the second question indicates a philosophical attitude to keep the mind as open as possible. Because the potential for non-existent things to happen leads us to have a very broad perspective on possibilities. In this context, although budget figures tell us how much allocation has been made for the next year, which issues are considered more important than others, which problems are accepted to exist, which problems are given priority, they do not constitute data beyond assumptions about the extent of the problems experienced throughout the country in the future. Based on this, "What are the practical problems of the people, the real owners of sovereignty, arising from the streets?" Let's try to answer the question.

Although the budget allocates a certain amount to education, it does not tell us anything about the efforts to erode "National Education". Although we, as families, spend more and more money on the education of our children, we do not know why we are falling behind in the world rankings. The Constitution and laws are inadequate to explain how it is possible, in terms of public policy, for communities and sects, which I call "ghost organizations" because they do not have legal personality, to enter schools. The fact that no one has anything to say about non-compliance with the laws and the Constitution, which are the interface of the people's right to sovereignty, cannot be directly explained with numbers.

It is not a budget problem that national education policies in the country are determined overnight by destroying all public policy processes. Contrary to the demands of the economy, which requires intermediate staff, opening many universities and then sharing these staff among various communities and trying to create its own intelligentsia in line with the ideology of the political power are not among the problems that the budget figures can tell us. The budget does not order that these academic positions be filled with highly unqualified and incompetent academics who lack intellectual knowledge and that public resources be wasted by giving these people titles they do not deserve. Aiming to transform a society by opening imam-hatip high schools everywhere, contrary to economic needs, is not the result of the budget.

The fact that the government does not offer a solution for our children going to school hungry also shows that this is not seen as a problem for the government. It is not possible to see in the budget the fact that the bright minds of the country are somehow being tried to be sent abroad by their families. On this issue, Daron Acemoğlu says that "Turkey is on the verge of collapse", but those who govern the country do not see this as a public problem. Naturally, it is not possible to see in the budget figures a tendency towards science that will eliminate this situation.

While the institutional culture of the Turkish Armed Forces is being destroyed by the political power, the whole society applauding how its own security has been weakened does not appear in the budget figures. Those who eliminate the right of the Force Commands, which are the only place of employment for their graduates, in the recruitment of students to the Military Academy, which is the apple of the eye of the Turkish army, and enable the communities to be effective in the student selection processes, will not take this courage from the budget. While the rights of retired colonels are given to individuals of various ranks who were dismissed from the Turkish Armed Forces due to their membership in religious communities, by destroying the basic principles of administrative law, this legal massacre is not due to the budget. You cannot explain this to officers who left the ranks of lieutenant colonel and major with their own will and honor.

Exposing qualified and trained personnel to heavy workload, mobbing, low wages and violence in the provision of health services and encouraging them to go abroad has nothing to do not only with the budget but also with economic logic. Because training healthcare personnel requires a costly and difficult process. This cost is covered from public resources. The loss of each healthcare worker also means wasted public resources. In other words, it means wasting the taxes paid by the people. Healthcare that performs its duty despite heavy working conditions Not showing any will to stop violence against employees is not an attitude related to the budget.

Giving away the country's strategic resources to international capital and trying to portray them as success to the society are not included in the budget. The fact that public investments, which cost one unit, cost five units to the public due to guaranteed payments, is only a matter of the budget in terms of the resources to be transferred to the contractors who won this honey börek tender.

The politicization of the judiciary, making political decisions rather than legal ones, is an issue that has become a social reality, even though it is not included in the budget. You cannot add justice to the budget as a figure. It is not a budget issue that the members of the Supreme Court, who attempted to coup the state order by declaring that they would not recognize the country's constitution, went unanswered in their attack on the sovereignty of the people. The loyalty of MPs who look into someone's mouth to make illegal laws and who feed on people's taxes is not a budget problem, but their loyalty to one person, not the nation.

You cannot explain the budget to fill the country with millions of refugees who may have security and survival problems and to provide them with free health insurance. Granting the same guarantees to unknown people that he withholds from his own citizens (!) has nothing to do with either the budget or patriotism. It is not possible to explain the logic of mortgaging the future of our children and youth by disrupting the demography of the country with patriotism.

It is not possible to include the lines on the faces of people who search for their share of the national income in the garbage in the evening market places in the budget. Likewise, the impact of restaurant windows on humanity, which people who are victims of tax and income injustice watch with disgust, cannot be included in the budget figures; Just like the cost of the life that parasites, protected by the political power, live by evading and avoiding paying taxes is not included in the budget.

It is possible to increase the examples. Many problems and their solutions are not included in the budget. But every problem arises from citizens who are unaware of their budgetary rights and accept their fate like sheep in line at the slaughterhouse. The budget figures you are indifferent to today will come back to you tomorrow as religious oppression, wage injustice, income injustice, tax injustice, lawlessness, violence, poverty and corruption. Politicians are your servants, not you politicians. Unless you understand this, you will not have much of a choice other than accepting everything the immoral politicians who look down on you do. If in a country the state generally makes demands from the people rather than the people from the state, the political institution in that country is corrupt. The public must first be aware of everything that is going on, and then make choices in accordance with what they see and evaluate. Otherwise, he/she will continue to look for the solution at the source of the problems and get used to living with chronic frustration. The practice of life requires this.