August 2014. The Central Bank of Chile publishes its second Business Perceptions Report (IPN) of the year, a recently created document by the issuing institute and whose contents emanate from surveys carried out by economists from the Studies Division to business executives (100th edition in that period). What did it conclude regarding business sentiments regarding investment?: “According to those surveyed, the outlook for investment continues to point to low growth, mostly associated with the mandatory replacement of installed capacity or some improvements that allow labor savings in sectors such as agriculture, which still have a shortage of it.” August 2024. The Central Bank publishes the edition of its IPN, which is now published four times a year, and which in this version indicates in its introduction that it conducted 537 valid surveys and covered 37 interviews. The investment scenario recorded by this latest version of the report remains inauspicious, noting that “although a large part of companies expect to close this year with results slightly above or similar to those of 2023, there is still a feeling of caution regarding the future performance of the economy as a whole, which continues to influence the absence of new, larger-scale investment projects.” The review of the Central Bank's IPNs, from its inception in 2013 to date, may come to resemble an act of masochism. With very few exceptions, for more than a decade the average mood has been one of caution or open pessimism, with reports from February and May 2020 reaching superlative levels of uncertainty and discouragement, cumulatively reflecting the effects of the post-social outbreak period and the first months of the pandemic. It is often heard that nothing lasts forever, but a decade of poor economic performance, with cautious or downright pessimistic expectations, makes the question that economist Jorge Quiroz posed a few days ago about whether what the country is experiencing is a bad streak or a process of decline, a valid matter for debate. It was a provocation, of course, but it must be agreed that Quiroz may have a point. Not a few days ago, the Central Bank, when announcing the performance of Chile's GDP in the second quarter of the year (1.6%), reported that Gross Fixed Capital Formation (investment, in simplified terms) fell 4.1% compared to April-June 2023, accumulating four consecutive quarters of contractions. And although in relation to the depressed quarter immediately preceding this indicator registered an increase, the forecast for the year as a whole remains negative, with which, according to economists, a sad record will be recorded, namely that, for the first time in 40 years, investment will fall after having previously closed a year without growth. An analysis by the Center for Public Studies (CEP) in June, written by researcher Gabriel Ugarte, highlighted in its abstract a significant fact: «In the last ten years, investment has increased well below the growth of the economy, which was already at deteriorating levels. In other words, investment represents an increasingly smaller component of our production and, even more worrying, there is no sign of a significant change in this situation in the future.”To continue digging and recording evidence at this point could be morbid, especially because the idea is already quite clear. Beyond circumstantial data that may affect the growth picture (Imacec/GDP), for too long the Chilean economy has been lacking a missing link that would allow the ends of the productive gear to be connected and, in this way, begin to establish on more solid bases the urgent recovery of activity and employment; and, ultimately, of income, among which of course we must count that of the treasury, which depends (it is very clear) on what private economic agents are capable of creating and producing.On occasion, we hear the authorities say that we should look at the possible better future economic expectations, inviting us to raise our spirits with a logic of the present value of future flows. And it is not that this invitation is devoid of meaning, but a minimum of realism should, when designing public policies, consider the issue in structural terms, including in the analysis the accumulated liabilities of the country in terms of investment and the responsibility that falls to them when it comes to making things happen… and happen for the better in the lives of Chileans.Roberto Sapag is a journalist specializing in economics and a consultant in communications, reputation and sustainability. Subscribe here to the EL PAÍS Chile newsletter and receive all the key information on current events in the country.