The Government’s “fiscal drift” It is the central axis of the study prepared by the Juan de Mariana Institute, which recalls that since Pedro Sánchez came to the Government, 81 tax and contribution increases have been approved in Spain. “In addition, taxes have not been adjusted to take into account – they say – the increase in inflation, which has accumulated an increase of close to 19%.”
“Fiscal populism” is the title of a study in which the ‘think tank’ directed by Manuel Llamas warns that the PSOE has proposed up to 46 new tax collection measures in 2025, most of them “focused on further increasing the tax pressure borne by companies and families.” However, it also specifies that the “precarious parliamentary arithmetic on which the Government is based” makes it difficult to predict which of these measures will end up coming into force.
According to the research service, the objective of these collection measures is to increase income by about 8 billion and they denounce that the socialists have only put on the table two tax relief measures that would have a minimal impact, 0.6% on revenue. They explain that instead, “tax increases abound, some of which would have a very destructive effect.” They cite the definitive maintenance of the banking tax, whose application in 2023 and 2024 was accompanied by a drop of 40,000 million in the financing granted by the financial sector to companies and families, and the increase in diesel taxes, “so that 14.9 million people will pay an average of 7.5 euros more every time they fill the tank of their car ».
The Institute assures that under the Government of Pedro Sánchezbetween 2019 and 2023, tax increases worth 9,625 million have been adopted, as well as increases in contributions for another 26,115 million. They add that to these figures we must add the increase in revenue due to inflation, which has meant “a hidden increase in taxation of 27.1 billion.”
Specific bonuses
The experts who have carried out the work report that although the Government has approved some downward modifications to certain taxes, in most cases they have simply been specific bonuses, “as we saw – they say – with the VAT or the Tax Hydrocarbons as a result of the inflationary crisis. They state that in net terms, For every euro dedicated to tax relief measures, 3.4 euros of increased tax collection have been adoptedwhich results in “a very negative balance for taxpayers.”
According to their calculations, the almost 42,000 million accumulated impact of the increases in taxes and contributions applied since Sánchez was installed in La Moncloa is equivalent to about 2,200 euros per household, says the study, which states that Spain is the third country in the EU that has increased its fiscal pressure the mostSince Sánchez has been president, between 2018 and 2023. The increase has been 2.9 points of GDP, compared to the reduction of 0.8% in the European Union.
The ‘hoax’ of the Executive and Madrid
“It is a hoax to imply that the rich barely pay taxes in Spain,” says the Juan de Mariana Institute. He assures that although Pedro Sánchez and his Minister of Finance, Maria Jesus Montero“they have tried to cultivate this discourse, the truth is that their assertions lack all rigor.” According to their data, there are barely 5.2% of taxpayers with income of more than 60,000 euros per year and that those 1.2 million filers contribute 41.7% of the personal income tax collection.
Regarding Madrid’s tax system, the Institute says that “it is not true” that the tax cuts applied to high incomes are a “tax gift” to the rich. «Even having lower taxesis the region that obtains a greater percentage of personal income tax collected from the 1st and 10% of taxpayers with the highest income. To be precise, these two segments contribute 21.78 and 53.75% of what Madrid obtains via personal income tax, he concludes.
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