The state needs money, so there are all kinds of tax options to bring money to the budget as quickly as possible. An idea that has been circulating in the financial world lately is related to the payment of CASS (health care) on dividends, but not limited to it, according to our information. This is 10% of the total amount.

Please note that this is currently only a discussion. No decision was made.

In the Fiscal Code, this is income from investments, there are others, for example, from bank interest. What we write here will also apply to them.

CASS currently pays capped dividends at 6, 12 or 24 minimum wages. If we look at the minimum salary from 2023, it will be 18,000 lei, 36,000 lei and 72,000 lei (valid for 2024).

For example, if the dividends received by the entrepreneur exceed 100,000 lei, he pays, in addition to the 8% tax, an amount of 7,200 lei to CASS.

*The amount of 7,200 lei is independent of the amount of dividends. It can also be 1 million lei, they will pay 7200 lei.

If the idea of ​​not paying the limit is implemented, it will give 10,000 lei. That is, 2,800 lei more. Basically, 10% is calculated on the entire amount, not on the ceiling.

Another example: an entrepreneur collects slightly smaller dividends between 12 and 24 salaries: 71,900 lei. In 2024, he would have to pay an amount of 3,600 lei according to current legislation.

If the legislation is amended, it will be about 7,190 lei, that is, much more.

Those who receive dividends well above the 24 salary limit will be most affected by such a measure.

We would like to clarify that in the version of the tax increase project presented by HotNews.ro, it was only about independent activities, this discussion of dividends is new.

Under these conditions, if adopted, many entrepreneurs could ask themselves the question: are we getting better health care if we pay more?

Additionally, an increase in dividend tax from 8% to 10% is still under consideration.

Cornell Grama – tax consultant: Let them introduce CAS, and we will all turn off the lights and leave

“Of all the ‘madness’ I have seen in the intentions of the governors, this seems to me to be the most fire-fighting and absolutely without any economic considerations,” Cornel Grama, a fiscal consultant, told HotNews.ro.

Let’s see why.

“First, if we remember when it was decided to increase the tax on dividends from 5% OG 16 from July 2022 to 8% (from 2023). What did the entrepreneurs do? Well, they took the dividend out of the company (they actually decapitalized it) between July 2022 and December 2022 to benefit from the 5% quota,” he says.

• Starting in 2023, the 8% dividend tax collection was very low or non-existent because what should have been withdrawn as dividends was withdrawn in 2022.

“Now the increase in tax on dividends from 8% to 10% is being discussed and the scandal has started in the Coalition. Can you imagine if there will be such an uproar in the Coalition for these 2 percentage points that it will be, for example, when to the dividends that the associated companies receive from the company, an additional 10% is added (CASS share), – explains Grama.

• “Let’s think about how much would be collected from the state budget if these dividends stopped being paid or were almost never paid. Practically, the taxation of dividends would be 10% + 10%, i.e. 20%.”

“Never in the economic history of Romania has dividend taxation been so high. I say CAS should also be implemented on dividends at 25%, we all switch off the lights and go,” says the tax consultant.

According to him, the business environment will find alternative methods, but the effect in the economy will be the growth of the economy from a white zone to a gray or black zone of tax evasion.

“Every time taxes are raised, putting more pressure on the business environment, it either leads to the closure of companies, or those who stubbornly resist the market will use other shelters in the gray or black areas of the economy. In both situations, the state budget will not be collected even close to the sums that the governors imagine in their offices,” concludes Cornel Grama.

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