News Focus: The economy in a time of political bargaining. Impact online
The talks between PSD, PNL, USR and UDMR, mediated by President Nicușor Dan, lasted about a month in order to reach a consensus on the formation of a new government and the assumption of economic measures to reduce the deficit. In this analysis, we intend to highlight, in particular, how the economy has become the backdrop for the political negotiations, at a time when the deficit issue has been a major issue since the very beginning of the negotiations.
As the data analyzed and aggregated with NewsVibe, an AI-supported platform for analyzing online conversations in real time, shows, the impact in the most relevant online sources of the discussions about the economy has been significant. In the last month alone, there were over 13,300 mentions of economic measures and the budget deficit issue, reaching an estimated 200 million views.
We emphasize that the main moments of visibility on economic issues were generated mainly by signals coming from the parties, amid negotiations, and especially at times when the general impression was that there was a disagreement or diverging views between the political parties involved in the talks.
Grafic NewsVibe. Changes in the number of mentions of deficit-reducing economic measures and their total impact over the last month
Predominant sources
The top sources writing most about deficit-reducing economic measures in the last month are dominated by generalist websites and news and Facebook pages associated with such media sources. Of these, the Adevărul and EVZ.ro stand out, with more than 300 mentions on the topic of interest, and the stiripesurse.ro website, with more than 200 such mentions.
Only three economic sources are present in the top, namely the Capital, economedia.ro and Economica.net websites.
These data show, in fact, that the discussion about the deficit reduction measures was of interest to all major news sources, not just economic news - which also means that the debate on these measures reached many audiences.
Grafic NewsVibe. Top relevant web sources that have covered economic measures to reduce the deficit in the last month
Top keywords mentioned
The top of the most mentioned topics in association with economic measures to reduce the deficit reflects the importance of discussions at the political level, with Romania, Nicușor Dan, Ilie Bolojan, PSD, PNL, USR, USR, PNL, PNL, USR, PSD, PNL, UDMR (the main political actors involved in the negotiations), but also the European Union or EU (the European Commission warning about the situation of the budget deficit of our country), or VAT (the possible increase of this tax being one of the main measures brought up in this period).
On the backdrop of the domestic discussions, the most relevant online sources also paid attention to the US discussions, related to the Trump administration's economic policies and their possible global influence. It is not to ignore the fact that, in the domestic debate, from pro or against positions, various actions of the US administration have been discussed from the perspective of a model that they may represent for other states, including Romania.
Grafic NewsVibe. Top entities mentioned in the context of mentions of deficit-reducing economic measures in the past month
Evaluating the tone of communication
The NewsVibe platform has created an advanced sentiment analysis system that uses artificial intelligence, specially trained algorithms, and LLM-like language models to detect nuances of tone - favorable, unfavorable, or neutral - in the context of references to entities relevant to an online conversation.
Grafic NewsVibe. Automated online conversation tone rating on economic measures to reduce the deficit in the last month
The tone of the online conversation around measures to reduce the budget deficit is dominated by negative terminology, with more than 27% of mentions categorized as such by the NewsVibe software, with only 69% of references in neutral context, indicating a relatively high degree of controversy. This has also influenced the tone of online conversations about the actors involved in the negotiations - namely president Nicușor Dan, PSD, PNL, USR and UDMR, albeit to different degrees.
These data show that the new Government is starting its mandate under the auspices of significant pressure related to the economic measures to be implemented and their impact on society and the business environment. The economic measures may become a central element of polarization in the immediate period ahead.
Emoji and hashtags
The most commonly used emoji in Facebook posts where the topic of economic measures to reduce the deficit was mentioned symbolize state of alert, Romania, economic situation, breaking news or analysis - in tune with the public's expectations for such a moment.
Grafic NewsVibe. Top emoji used on Facebook in conversations about deficit-cutting economic measures over the past month
The most used hashtags on social networks reflect the topic itself, through descriptive tags such as #deficit, #budget, #nicusordan, #government, #romania, but also the widespread concern of some media outlets with the topic, including through their own actions aimed at generating interactivity with the public on social networks.
Grafic NewsVibe. Top hashtags used on Facebook in conversations about deficit-cutting economic measures in the past month
The data analyzed shows that the topic of economic measures to reduce the budget deficit has become a major landmark in the public debate, with strong echoes in online conversations, in the press and on social networks. The high visibility and predominantly negative tone of online discussions about the economic measures suggest that they will remain a controversial central topic on the public and political agenda in the coming period.
*****Summary compiled using a monitoring feed provided by NewsVibe Romania. The analysis, data and images presented were enhanced with Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence tools.
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