4liberty.eu N E W S L E T T E R [MAY 2020]
The May issue of the 4liberty.eu Newsletter provides an overview of the articles published on the 4liberty.eu website, serving as a starting point for further exploration.
The May issue of the 4liberty.eu Newsletter provides an overview of the articles published on the 4liberty.eu website, serving as a starting point for further exploration.
The April issue of the 4liberty.eu Newsletter provides an overview of the articles published on the 4liberty.eu website, serving as a starting point for further exploration.
A special issue of the 4liberty.eu Newsletter provides an overview of the articles devoted to the topic of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemics, providing a wide range of perspectives to help make sense of the situation.
We are pleased to present the twelfth issue of 4liberty.eu Review, titled “Taxing Taxation: Labor and Capital in CEE”. This time our primary focus is the taxation of labor and capital – from the cases of Poland and the Czech Republic, to Ukraine, Bulgaria, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Paying taxes does not need to (and should not!) be taxing. Quite the contrary – it must be clear, straightforward, effortless, and taxpayer-friendly. What every taxation system needs is thus sensible policymakers who would look at the state expenditures and think of the ways of improving the exiting system and tax collection mechanisms.
Taxation is an involuntary payment levied on various entities in order to finance the state budget1. Clearly, the tax burden is heavily influenced by the philosophy of the role of the state in the public life, as well as quantity and quality of public services rendered.
The final effect of the carbon tax is determined by the way in which additional resources are handled. Every tax results in reallocation of scarce resources for purposes less desired by consumers. Not only do taxes diminish the utility of a consumer, but they also have a negative impact on economic growth.
Sectoral tax, i.e. higher taxation, which affects only selected sectors of the economy (such as banking, insurance, energy, telecommunications, or the information technology segment) is considered to be an effective tool for increasing state budget revenues.
Currently, the Czech Republic does not have a separate capital gains tax for individuals or for corporations; capital gains are included in PIT and CIT. There are also a few cases in which capital gains are exempt, mainly pertaining to property.
During the late 1990s and most part of the 2000s, CEE countries reformed their tax systems with two key characteristics: reducing the relative burden of direct taxes and – probably more distinctly, at least for the rest of the developed economies – introduction of single personal income tax rates.