Wedding rings are seen during the Central European Wedding Show in Budapest, Hungary, March 11, 2023. REUTERS/Bernadett Szabo
BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Soaring inflation is taking the steam out of Hungary's wedding market, supercharged in recent years by Prime Minister Viktor Orban's lavish family support measures, with the number of weddings plunging to a nine-year-low at the start of 2023.
Nationalist Orban, in power since 2010, has launched tax breaks, housing support schemes and cheap loans worth some 5% of economic output per year for newly weds to arrest Hungary's demographic decline, while strongly opposing immigration.
