We will explore some elements of this in today’s and tomorrow’s panel discussions where we aim to cover issues such as climate risk and sustainable finance, and the harnessing of innovation and disruption. But the point I want to emphasise here is that the financial system itself forms a core and fundamental part of the infrastructure of modern societies5.
Secondly, the new budget deficit ceiling – which is lower than before – helps to cope with another problem of the Israeli economy; the heavy burden of government debt as a ratio of GDP. This is because a smaller deficit leads to a reduction in the debt-to-GDP ratio. In 2005, the government managed to continue lowering public debt by maintaining a low budget deficit.