Battle of taxes

Sales tax challenges the VAT on Friday at the Center for Research Problems at the Financial Academy presented the report "Comparison of VAT and Sales Tax." The idea to order such a report was born in the Kremlin, in the expert administration of the president. Nevertheless, he was brought to the court of the political and scientific community. Members of the budget committees of the Federation Council and State Duma, who actively defending the idea of tax replacement, were in the hall. Representatives of the Ministry of Finance and the Federal Tax Service did not show themselves at the discussion. For them, ex-Minister of Finance, the auditor of the Accounts Chamber Vladimir Pantov, sharply objected to the authors of the report.

The third coming

The idea to cancel VAT together with the corruption system of its compensation was discussed for a long time. Nevertheless, until last Friday, it was not clear what was proposed to change. The only VAT opponent - sales tax (NSP) - was known in ancient Rome. There he applied to the purchase of slaves. In the twentieth century, he was introduced during the Second and Second World Wars, when the warring states began to sharply feel the need for money, and was canceled after the onset of peace. In the domestic economy, his ghost gained flesh twice - in 1990, in fact, as a revolutionary tax and in 2002 as a tax on a final consumer who purchased goods for cash in the retail network. In the first case, the NSP lasted a little over a year, it was replaced by VAT. In the second, the NSP cohabitant with VAT for almost two years, after which he was again canceled due to low utility - his contribution to the budget was about 10 times less than that of VAT. At the same time, the NSP was responsible for rising prices.

The third coming of the NSC in the Kremlin is expected no earlier than 2009. As they assure, it will become better, that is, it will cease to be revolutionary. According to the authors of the report, “the sales tax will not be transferred from the seller to the buyer throughout the production circuit, but will be accrued and levied at a rate of 10% only at the stage of final consumption. All legal entities that have turned out the sales of goods, works and services. At the same time, the revolutions of the goods, works, services that are not final consumption are exempted from, are exempted from taxation by tax ". Some trick of this formulation is clarified by the following position. For all legal entities, compulsory declaration will be introduced. It will help determine the stage of final consumption. The company or private person becomes a tax payer when the acquired by him cannot be attributed to the composition of the costs. Sales will be taxed by purchases of households "from first -need goods to real estate", as well as public procurement. It will not be possible to implement the schemes from the past, when a window window was located next to the cashier, where customers were offered to avoid sales tax through the opening of an account - the NSC will be charged in cash and non -cash payments, including cards.

Payers will also become small businesses, which today use a simplified taxation system.

This does not scare businessmen. "From firms using a simplified system, everyone shrugged for a long time due to the impossibility of applying VAT deductions for export operations," said Sergey Borisov, head of the Opora Gazeta Gazeta. According to him, "if the VAT is an almost invincible evil, it is advisable to consider its replacement tax on sales."

Sales tax price

Losses from tax replacement - the estimated price increase and the loss of budget revenues in the amount of over 200 billion rubles.

The authors of the report show a possible increase in prices on the example of medicines that were not taxed until 2002, and since January 2002 they began to be taxed at a rate of 10%. According to them, in the first two months, growth amounted to 5% and 3.1%, respectively. Further, prices grew monthly by approximately 1%, "approximately corresponding to the pace of inflation in the period under consideration." In other words, consumers received the rise in the cost of drugs for the tax rate almost in the quarter, and 80% of the rise in price in January -February. An example shows that the introduction of an NSP of 10% (no matter what tax it replaces) will lead to an increase in prices by 8% in the first two months.

According to experts, there are two anti -inflation exits. The first - the authorities intelligibly explain to the entrepreneurs the rules of the game (how it explains them with gasoline kings), the second - antitrust regulation.

Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Budget and State Duma’s budget and taxes, Sergei Shtogrin, said that in many cases, VAT has actually already became sales, and if so, then it should just help to bring the replacement to the end. Ildar Gabdrakhmanov, a member of the State Duma Budget Committee, believes that "the main advantage of sales tax is that it tolerates the load from the production sphere to the consumption sector." Senator Tatyana Popova, commenting on the tax replacement, called for caution: if the taxation database is not registered clearly enough, loopholes will immediately appear.

The ex-Minister of Finance, the auditor of the Honorary Chamber, Vladimir Pantov, spoke more sharply: the economy may face no less problems than today with VAT.

It is easy to criticize VAT - it has existed for almost fifteen years, and the entrepreneurial community, of course, has accumulated many complaints to it. "The existing practice means serious costs for the taxpayer, associated primarily with VAT reimbursement, and all attempts to improve the situation often led only to a deterioration in the provision of taxpayers," the newspaper said the deputy head of the RSPP tax committee Sergey Belyakov. According to him, "we can consider the replacement of VAT tax on sales, or you can reduce the rate of VAT itself." Another expert argues as follows: “Why should we cancel the tax (VAT -“ newspaper ”), which allowed our tax system to comply with the European one? We cannot restore order at customs and stop the existence of one -day firms, so what does the tax system have been compensated for us, and they have a well in France. With the Ministry of Internal Affairs and GTK, if they put things in order with administration, VAT will work perfectly. ” If the rate is reduced, the same thing will be.

03/12/2006 / Grigory Ilyin, the material was published in the "newspaper" No. 41 of 03/13/2006.