Expert-Grup: Tax policy for 2024 includes combating the phenomenon of envelope wages and encouraging employers "to come out in the white"
The tax policy for 2024 is not coming to increase the tax pressure on business, but rather to bring the industry into compliance. At the same time, the document provides for measures related to combating the phenomenon of envelope wages and incentivising employers to "come out in white", i.e. to work legally. Next year's tax policy was analysed by the Expert-Grup analytical centre.
The programme director of the Expert-Grup Analytical Centre, Stas Madan, giving an overall assessment of the tax policy, says it "does not come to increase the overall tax burden on business, but rather focuses its tax compliance efforts to increase the base from which taxes are collected".
"In the sense of increasing taxes for the coming years, it will only increase the taxation of vices, when we talk about certain excise taxes or from an environmental protection perspective, such as, for example, excise taxes on petroleum products."
Fair taxes for drivers
Experts say there is currently tax unfairness for drivers when they pay road user charges. In this case, they have come up with several proposals.
"We also welcome the ministry's intention to apply VAT to imported cars. We draw attention to the need to develop the mechanism for establishing the customs value, especially for vehicles that are transported damaged, where there may be problems in establishing the customs value of these transport units and not to admit its arbitrary decrease and perpetuation of the phenomenon of corruption," said Vitalie Rapcea, program director, Expert-Grup.
One of the tax policy measures, equal taxation of all investment instruments, will improve the financial autonomy of local authorities, experts say. According to them, LPAs will be able to apply for funding projects more easily.
"If we detail one of the aspects we looked at, we see that things could be improved, I will refer to the taxation of investment income. For example, on bank deposits now it is 7 percent, it is reduced to 6 percent, and on government securities from 12 to 6 percent. Our proposal in this regard is to ensure this uniform taxation of all investment instruments. We have proposed to include municipal bonds," says Stas Madan, programme director at Expert-Grup Analytical Centre.
One of the objectives of tax policy is to eliminate the phenomenon of envelope wages. Better incentives for employers are foreseen for this.
Vitalie Rapcea, programme director, Expert-Grup, thinks it is a good thing that the Ministry of Finance has come up with proposals to allow the possibility of deducting expenses for incentives and gifts for employees or possibly financing an additional medical policy for employees from the employer's account.
"The good thing is that, directly, by granting the possibility of deducting these expenses, we are encouraging the legalisation of these expenses. In other words, economic agents will be interested in obtaining the tax invoice for this type of expenditure so that it can be deductible."
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, in the first quarter of this year, the number of people in employment was over 865 thousand. Of these, 6.8% received envelope wages.
