Businesspeople and taxation
In Bucharest, businesspeople have received assurances from the Government that no new fiscal measures will be adopted without consulting the business community.
Daniela Budu, 19.03.2025, 13:50
During a meeting with representatives of the Concordia Employers’ Confederation, Romania’s PM, Marcel Ciolacu, has given assurances that the government will continue to maintain an open dialogue with trade unions and employers’ associations regarding economic decisions and reforms necessary for the sustainable development of the country. According to a government press release, the PM stressed the importance of reforms and attracting European funds to stimulate economic growth and reduce the budget deficit this year. At the same time, digitalization was addressed as the driving force behind reforms and the simplification of interaction between the business environment, citizens and authorities. They also discussed the involvement of the Concordia Employers’ Confederation in the process of reviewing the fiscal framework, by appointing a representative to contribute to the development of fair and stable measures for the business environment. Moreover, the representatives of the Confederation have received assurances that no new fiscal measures will be adopted without consulting the business environment, and the state budget will be based on reducing public spending, massive investments in the economy, without other increases in taxes and duties.
In turn, the business people have once again asked the government for a predictable taxation system and have told the PM that labor taxation is too high in Romania. Recently, the president of the Confederation, Dan Şucu, has also stated that maintaining the flat tax rate has had beneficial effects on economic growth, but with a tax burden of over 40% for labor taxation in Romania, any tax increase will have a negative impact on the citizens’ incomes, consumption and implicitly the GDP. On the other hand, the business environment has drawn attention to the fact that in Romania there are many institutions that have similar control responsibilities. The executive director of the Confederation, Radu Burnete, stated, after discussions with the Prime Minister, that he is not asking for the checks on companies to stop, but he wants the applied sanctions to be proportional to the detected violations.
Radu Burnete: “We believe that through dialogue we could reach a common denominator. No one is saying that companies should not be controlled, they should be controlled!, but it should happen in a rational way and the punishments should be proportional and lead to the correction of the respective behavior.”
Regarding the order of the National Authority for Consumer Protection, which could oblige economic operators to display the commercial mark-up, in addition to the final price of the product on the shelf, Radu Burnete said: “Such a thing is impossible. There are traders who have 20-30 thousand products. How can you display the mark-up on the shelf, especially since the mark-up changes, from producers to traders there are a lot of intermediaries. I think the Competition Council might also have something to say in this sense.” said Radu Burnete, who added that discussing such a measure is completely unproductive. (LS)
