sharing the tax burden more equitably, improving the equalisation capacity of public transfers. these results also rely on structural interventions to improve the underlying capacity of the italian economy to post higher growth, above and beyond short - term stimuli. any improvement achieved thanks to public intervention in the areas of income and its distribution will be the more solid, the more it is rooted in solid funding measures and the more carefully it is designed to take account of the incentives to create income and jobs, this being the most reliable way to combat the spread of poverty. tables and figures table 1 macroeconomic outlook in the most recent official documents ( percentage changes ) economic and financial document 2018 update to the 2018 economic and financial document current legislation scenario real gdp 1. 5 1. 5 1. 4 1. 3 1. 2 1. 6 1. 2 0. 9 1. 1 1. 1 imports 5. 3 5. 4 4. 0 3. 4 3. 5 5. 2 1. 7 2. 6 2. 9 3. 5 consumption by households and nonprofit institutions serving households 1. 4 1. 4 1. 0 0. 9 1. 2 1. 5 1. 1 0. 7 0. 8 1. 1 general government expenditure 0. 1 0. 5 0. 1 0. 4 0. 6 - 0. 1 0. 4 0. 6 0. 6 0. 5 investment 3. 8 4. 1 2. 8 2. 4 1. 7 4. 3 4. 4 2. 2 1. 5 1. 6 exports 5. 4 5. 2 4. 2 3. 9 3. 2 5. 7 0. 4 2. 7 3. 4 3. 6 nominal gdp 2. 1 2. 9 3. 2 3. 1 2. 7 2. 1 2. 5 2. 7 2. 8 2. 6 consumption deflator 1. 2 1. 1 2. 2 2. 0 1. 5 1. 1 1. 3 2. 2 2. 0 1. 5 employment ( fte ) 0. 9 0. 8 0. 8 0. 9 0. 9 0. 9 0. 7 0. 6 0. 7 0. 8 policy scenario real gdp 1. 6 1. 2 1. 5 1. 6 1. 4 imports 5. 2 1. 7 3. 0 3. 8 4. 0 consumption by households and nonprofit institutions serving households 1. 5 1. 1 1. 3 1. 3 1. 2

, above all thanks to the positive performance of vat and personal income tax ( irpef ) revenue. if the data are adjusted to take account of some asymmetries of a purely accounting nature, the estimated increase in revenue would be greater, and basically consistent with the growth forecasts of general government tax revenue indicated in the update. in the policy scenario, the structural deficit ( that is, cyclically - adjusted and net of temporary measures ) is expected to reach 0. 9 per cent of gdp. the expected reduction in the structural deficit is less than that for the overall deficit ( 0. 2 percentage points versus 0. 5 points ) ; the difference is mainly due to the reduction in the output gap, as the net effects of the temporary measures are extremely limited in both 2017 and 2018. according to the update, in 2018 the debt - to - gdp ratio will fall slightly, from 131. 2 per cent at end - 2017 to 130. 9 per cent. the reduction is almost 1 percentage point less than that estimated in april, owing to higher net borrowing expectations and, especially, slower nominal gdp growth. as part of its september revision of the national accounts data, istat adjusted upwards its nominal gdp estimate for the two years 2016 - 17. owing to these changes, in both years the debt - to - gdp ratio decreased by about 0. 6 percentage points. public finance projections for 2019 - 2021 current legislation scenario. – the update revises the net borrowing forecasts for the three years 2019 - 2021 in the current legislation scenario, raising them ( compared with april ’ s def ) by 0. 4 percentage points for next year and by 0. 7 points for each of the two years 2020 - 21. the revision takes account of a worsening gdp growth outlook and of higher interest payments ( more than 0. 1 percentage points in 2019, 0. 2 points in 2020 and 0. 3 points in 2021 ). notwithstanding this revision, current legislation net borrowing is expected to continue to decrease, also thanks to the safeguard clauses ( whose effect is equal to 0. 7 per cent of gdp in 2019 and to 1. 0 per cent from 2020 onwards ) : as a percentage of gdp, net borrowing is estimated to fall to 1. 2 per cent in 2019, 0. 7 per cent in 2020 and 0. 5 in 2021. the nominal budget balance, which according to april ’ s def would have been attained in 2020, would now not be achieved in 2021 either. the