QCOSTARICA – The way out by the Government of Rodrigo Chaves to legislators in their fiscal strategy to leave the gray list of the European Union (EU), to tax all the companies equally with 30% income tax, is tied in the same bill, with the approval of global income.
In the Income Tax bill presented last week by the Ministry of Finance – together with four other tax projects – the approval of a single 30% tax on all companies, including extraterritorial passive income is the key to getting out of the EU list.
The proposal also includes a global income for natural persons, which has caused conflicting opinions among specialists and political parties. The Minister of Finance, Nogui Acosta, stated that there are other possibilities to make the necessary changes to the legislation without raising taxes on the population.
In an interview with Universidad, the Vice Minister of Income, Priscilla Zamora indicated that including extraterritorial passive income is the key point to get out of the European Union list, even confirmed that the project text was validated with them.
“It is a measure that allows us to avoid fiscal competition that can be created through regimes, such as Costa Rica currently,” the Vice Minister of Income, Priscilla Zamora, told Semanario Universidad in an interview.
“The minister (Nogui Acosta) said that there are other legislative possibilities and that they could be tried within the framework of the bills presented, but the important thing here is that we are putting a comprehensive solution for Costa Rica to stop putting patches to the legislation. With this, we solve the problem we have with the European Union and we attend to the recommendations made by organizations such as the International Monetary Fund about our income imposition system,” added the Vice Minister of Income.
Despite these explanations, the truth is that the income unification bill has generated different opinions among specialists, and even political parties in the Legislative Assembly such as the Partido Libeacion Nacional (PLN), which holds the largest block of legislative seats, the Frenta Amplio (FA) and the Partido Liberal Progresista (PLP), who have publicly announced they will not support a bill that imposes more taxes on the population.
