New budgetary and fiscal measures
The Romanian government has approved fiscal measures aimed at recovering as much as possible from the debts of natural persons and legal entities to the state budget. The goal is to reduce the budget deficit, one of the highest in the European Union.
Sorin Iordan, 05.09.2024, 14:00
The Romanian Government approved, by emergency ordinance, a series of measures aimed, mainly, at improving budget revenue collection and at recovering a significant part of the debts of natural persons and legal entities to the state budget. Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu rejected the accusations leveled by the opposition politicians that this move was, in fact, “an ordinance of austerity”, and showed that the document introduces, for the first time, bonuses for taxpayers who paid their taxes in due time. In turn, the Finance Minister, Marcel Boloş, declared that the debts of companies and individuals to the state budget exceeded, at the end of last month, 70 billion lei (about 14 billion Euros). He showed that there are 330,000 legal entities and more than 840,000 natural persons who are in this situation, and, according to the ordinance, they could benefit from exemptions and even cancellations if they comply with payment obligations by November 25.
Marcel Boloş: “For legal entity taxpayers, the cancellation of accessories has been approved as a percentage of 100% of their value, accessories meaning interest, late payment penalties and non-declaration penalties, and for natural person taxpayers we have, depending on the value of the debts, fiscal facilities; so, if these debts are up to 5,000 lei, the cancellation of the accessories is 100%. Also, we have the cancellation of 50% of the main budgetary obligations, and if the debt is over 5,000 lei, then the cancellation of the main obligations is 25%.”
Another provision of the document approved by the Romanian executive aims at a better use of the funds allocated for expenses in public services. The finance minister explained that the investments carried out by town halls and county councils are exempt from this provision and that, moreover, the treasury loan ceiling for these projects has been increased.
Marcel Boloş is back with explanations: “To support the local public authorities and the investment projects they implement, the ceiling for contracting loans from the State Treasury for the implementation of investment projects was increased to the amount of 2 billion lei. Also the government approved the increase in the withdrawal ceiling by the amount of 700 million lei and, at the same time, a category of special loans was increased by the amount of 1.5 billion lei.”
The tax authority estimates that the measures approved by the government on Wednesday will reduce Romania’s budget deficit by approximately 9 billion lei (about 1.8 billion Euros) and this in the context in which the country has one of the largest budget deficits in the European Union. Economists anticipate that it will exceed 7% of the Gross Domestic Product at the end of the year. (LS)
