Komsomolskaya Pravda: “Russian citizens will no longer be victims of errors in tax collection”
Tax authorities will have to compete for their business as with the creation of the Common Economic Space companies may prefer registering in Belarus and Kazakhstan.
For the past ten years tax collection in Russia has increased seven times, but there is still room for improvement for both the tax authorities and the government. Yesterday Vladimir Putin talked discussed the issue at the tax conference in Moscow.
According to the prime-minister, the government intends to increase treasury earnings not only by raising income taxes on citizen and business but rather by improving the quality of work performed by tax authorities and encouraging economic development.
Putin provided such an example: the current year has already seen 7,7 trillion roubles collected, and the figure is expected to reach 9,8 trillion by the end of the year. In 2000 treasury earnings were estimated to be 1,4 trillion roubles. According to the results of the previous year, earnings from income tax alone exceeded the total budget of the country for the year 2000.
The prime minister emphasized that the 13% tax rate is still one of the lowest in the world.
"There are many ongoing disputes regarding this issue. But I believe we did the right thing," commented Putin. "First of all, we have thus created conditions for making salaries official and thus protecting the social rights of the employees."
As for allocating budget earnings, the system used now presupposes that taxes stay where the companies work.
"The tax burden itself should be fairly allocated to different economic spheres," claimed Vladimir Putin. "It is necessary to provide stable tax flow to all levels of budget system – from the federal to the municipal."
However there are still many unresolved issues. According to information from the World Bank, it takes Russian businesses twice as long than developed countries to prepare tax reports.
"You know well, thirty three million Russian citizens have become involuntary tax debtors due to mistakes in addresses, personal details and the payment calculations," reminded Putin. "The total amount of tax debt calculated by error is estimated to be thirty-six billion roubles."
It has recently been decided to simply write off such debts which occurred before January 1, 2009. Putin reminded tax authorities that this has to be done during the first quarter of 2012. In the business sphere we will soon witness competition in the attempt to win over tax payers, given that beginning January 1 the Common Economic Space of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan will launch.
"We will need to establish highly attractive tax procedures, or else companies or businesses will leave," stressed the prime minister. "Some companies have already registered in Kazakhstan, some will go to Belarus. Our taxation system and administrative procedures should be competitive."
Valery Butayev
