As the government scrimps and saves, or at least scrimps, in order to stuff the public deficit hole, it is those who endeavour to work for themselves or who have only part-time work that will most likely pay the highest price.
This week the government officially killed off the flat rate tax system, which was applied successfully in Slovakia for 9 years and gave self-employed a chance to keep more of their irregular earnings as a large chunk was written off as automatic expenses. That luxury is no longer, however.
An article in daily Hospodarske Noviny also points to how many people will lose their jobs as the levy burden on employers is also hiked up from January 2013, and those on part-time work agreements will also be subject to higher social insurance levies.
According to the daily, the new rules affect around 600,000 people, with thousands set to be sacked as employers cannot afford them under the new levy system. Poll agencies are given as an example, as they hire people for short periods of time throughout the year to carry out their surveys and opinion polls. Two agencies told the daily that they would now have to let their 300 plus part-time employees go.
A sad but telling tale. A young lady, who has studied and obtained all the relevant qualifications, and until this year was employed “dohodu” as a beautician decided to solve the problems the new employment rules create by starting her own business. One small problem she does not have the state exam as required by the business register, another bigger problem is the state don’t run that exam! So we have a hard working, well qualified young woman who is being denied the right to work by the very state that set the stupid rules in the first place.
It may come as a revelation to some, but other than the regulated professions – doctor, etc. why do they set so many hoops and hurdles for people? I find that people who can’t hairdress don’t, people who hairdress badly don’t get any business and go bust so in many respects many businesses are self regulating so why do we have buildings full of non-jobs checking every dot and crossed T on a mountain of paperwork that actually proves nothing?
An illustration – in the past year 2 young men have tried to run a pizza business in a shop nextdoor to an established pizza franchise. The franchise just undercut all their prices and they both went bust with debts to suppliers, unpaid wages etc. Both had all the correct paperwork but absolutely no business nounce – QED waste of time.
Come the glorious revolution, no person in the party will pay tax and bread and milk will again be 1 Slovak krone . We are ready to take power back to the people.
To be fair that could be anywhere.
600,000 to join the dole queue, the head of the OECD rubbishes BnMs plans for the ecconomy, growth set to fall to the lowest in a decade, companies abandoning ship daily, 230 million in tax not collected from last year, major companies involved in a tax fiddle cartel, stories of graft, corruption and cronyism everyday – Alarm bells ringing yet?, Hello anyone bothered?
The Slovak government has declared war on the self-employed and small businesses. If you are a small business you will pay 23 percent on your profit plus another 14 percent for health insurance (up to a fixed maximum absolute sum). That means the real rate of taxation for a small business will from 2013 be 37 percent. Two years ago it was 19 percent. Massive increases in (already high) unemployment and the closure of thousands of small businesses are absolutely certain. What a stupid set of policies…