Slovak News Back to the news
AZZZ Lobbying for 25-percent Cut in Payroll Taxes
Thursday 21 January 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, January 21 (TASR)- Slovakia's largest federation of employers AZZZ said on Thursday that the country's payroll tax is one of the highest in the European Union (EU) and it therefore proposes its gradual reduction from 35.2 percent to 25 percent by 2014.
Federation of Employers' Associations president Tomas Malatinsky told reporters that AZZZ plans to submit its proposal to the main political parties. The expectation is that they will include this measure among their election platforms, and in the Manifesto of the new Government.
To offset the payroll-tax shortfall, AZZZ looks to the various types of insurance held with the pension provider Socialna Poistovna (SP) – sickness, disability, accident and unemployment insurance – that show a positive balance.
Malatinsky specifically pointed out that the funds should not be extracted from the old-age pension scheme, which has a well-entrenched negative balance. He added that President Ivan Gasparovic promised his support for the AZZZ initiative.
The 25 percent payroll tax cut would cause an annual shortfall of €1.5 billion. However, "in the long run it will have a favourable impact on the economy in terms of the sustainability as well as attractiveness (of Slovakia) for foreign and domestic investors to do business in Slovakia," Malatinsky said.
All rights reserved. Any publishing or further dissemination of press releases and photographs from TASR's resources without TASR's prior written approval constitutes a violation of the Copyrights Act.
