The National Council of SMEs in Romania (CNIPMMR), a nationally representative employers' confederation that ensures the representation of the interests of small and medium-sized enterprises at national and European level, requests that any reform or measure adopted in the fiscal field, which aims to increase revenues collected to the state budget, to be done on the principle of "from large to small", the tax burden being borne by all economic actors, not just SMEs, like this:
- Government: to reduce budget expenditures by reducing and streamlining the state apparatus; according to country recommendations, to increase the collection of taxes and duties and to streamline their collection by combating the underground economy and undeclared work; to tax the profits made by companies in various fields at the expense of consumers (taxing inflation generators), taxing the repatriation of profits, taxing special pensions, etc.
- Large enterprises (e.g. companies in the pharmaceutical, energy and oil sectors that during the Covid period and in the current context of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict have recorded large increases in revenue) to contribute more to the state budget, relative to the level of profit and turnover compared to SMEs (which have suffered the most as a result of Covid-19 measures and the increase in prices in the energy and fuel sectors), through a "solidarity tax".
Given the positive context that large companies in the fields listed above are currently benefiting from, we believe that they should assume voluntarily payment of this tax or to create a special fund to which to contribute and from which to finance investments in education and healthcare (e.g. construction of hospitals, renovation of schools, etc.).
In response to the expectations of SMEs, the Ministry of Finance published in public consultation draft ordinance amending and supplementing Law no. 227/2015 on the Fiscal Code, the repeal of certain normative acts and other fiscal measures, from which we note the following:
- reducing the ceiling on income obtained in the previous year, from 1,000,000 euros to 500,000 euros for classification in the micro-enterprise category, will not bring significant income to the state budget (approx. 8,000 micro-enterprises will switch to paying profit tax);
- the increase in excise duties and VAT on some products will lead to increased prices, respectively additional costs for the population;
- reducing the ceilings on PFA (income norm) will generate a migration of PFAs in the IT field to micro-enterprises and the tax collected by the state will be lower than the income norm;
- none of these measures leads to a reduction in inflationary pressure on citizens;
- With the exception of measures regarding VAT and excise duties, all others are measures without fiscal and economic justification in the medium and long term.
Considering the above, SMEs' expectations from the government are:
- Ensuring the predictability of the tax system by announcing new measures at least 6 months before their application;
- Increasing public investment;
- Supporting existing businesses by providing investment grants for SMEs;
- Stimulating job retention and creating new jobs by setting the minimum wage in 2023 at 3,000 lei and limiting contributions to the level of the minimum wage in 2022;
- Stimulating investments in the private sector by recognizing 50% cost upon acquisition and the remaining 50% during the depreciation period (accelerated method)
- Subsidizing interest on loans for investments in productive equipment;
- Modifying the National Recovery and Resilience Plan in line with new realities: making investments in the irrigation system, providing grants for SMEs and supporting the establishment of regional warehouses.
