Reform of the tax system will be found in the ruling party’s electoral program for the next four years, with the goal of abolishing anachronistic revenue determination methods such as presumptions, while at the same time activating a two-tier system to secure government revenues.

In particular, changes are planned in the procedure for taxing the declared income of freelancers and self-employed, however, the relationship of cash registers with POS and the extension of the obligation to use POS to all the economy will become the basis for limiting tax evasion.

The goal is to reduce cash payments and the use of cards in the daily transactions of taxpayers. In this way, financial officers explain that it is possible to control the turnover of enterprises and the amount of transactions, which will simultaneously reduce the VAT gap and increase government revenues. Thus, in June 2023, the interconnection of cash registers with POS will begin, which will allow the government and the tax administration to cancel, for example, presumptions.

In June, the relationship between cash desks and POS begins.

The tax office will now be able to use electronic checks, e-books, cross-checking of income and deposits in banks and the use of cards by taxpayers to identify real income. According to a study by INE/GSEE (Professor of the Department of Economic Sciences at EKPA Georgia Kaplanoglu), the tax authorities resort to such an attempt to withdraw taxable material when, for various reasons, they do not consider it possible to determine it. directly. Characteristically, among high-income countries, only Greece and Italy use proof of life, while the method is more common in developing countries such as Kenya. Starting in 2010, under the pressure of the need to collect tax revenues and as a means of collecting undeclared taxable materials, the use of proof of life has been extended to almost all taxpayers. An annual target cost of living has been set for all primary and secondary living quarters from the first square meter in terms of their area, for all cars in terms of their cubic centimeters, for all boats in terms of their total length. This system is supported with very minor changes. These changes are reflected in a sharp increase in total income, which is calculated from cost-of-living estimates and added to taxpayer-reported income. If in 2008 the difference between taxable and declared income was less than 500 million euros, then in 2014 it increased to more than 7 billion euros and remains close to 6.5 billion euros.

An interesting discovery of researchers is the distribution of additional income as a result of assumptions about the cost of living. In 2014, 86% of the estimated €7 billion in additional living allowances estimated by the tax authorities went to the poorest 40% of taxpayers in 2014, according to the report, and in 2019 this figure rose to more than 88%. The share of imputed income for taxpayers with an annual declared income of less than EUR 5,000 increases from 65% in 2008 to 83% in 2014 and further to 85% in 2019.

According to the study, the poorest 40% of taxpayers pay a very small amount of personal income tax. In 2008, this amount was 19 million euros. After the presumptions were extended to all taxpayers, in 2014 the amount of personal income tax paid by the poorest 40% rose to 270 million euros (or 3.3% of total personal income tax revenue). Finally, in 2019 the corresponding amount was 211 million euros or 2.4% of total revenue. This entry shows that the amount charged by the government on presumptions is extremely small, as it is mostly found among low-income taxpayers.

However, the presumption system complicates the tax system, creates high compliance costs for taxpayers and administrative costs for the tax authorities, while its contribution to tax revenue appears to be limited. Well, only at first glance, it probably contributes to an indirect restriction of tax evasion.