ALEXANDER DERYUGIN NAMED REASONS FOR THE DECLINE IN PERSONAL INCOME TAX REVENUES
“Nezavisimaya gazeta” published an article in the latest issue about the impact of the new system of tax collection and enrollment on regional budgets after reviewing the research of Alexander Deryugin, a Researcher at the Gaidar Institute's Budget Policy Department.
According to the publication, most regional budgets feel good in 2023: regional revenues are significantly higher than their expenditures despite the fact that the federal budget deficit has already exceeded all the planned limits. According to the Gaidar Institute economists, more than 70 Russian regions showed an excess of revenues over expenditures in Q1 2023.
According to Alexander Deryugin, the transfer of taxpayers from early 2023 to the Unified Tax Account (UTA) caused many problems for regional budgets. The shift of tax payments and other innovations resulted in a decline in revenues to regional budgets and the need for additional borrowing.
The author also noted strange behavior of regional revenues: thus, if money from corporate income tax increased by 18.2%, the receipts from personal income tax (PIT) dropped by 20.3%. "This is not at all typical of crisis periods when the income tax usually demonstrates the largest drop, while PIT remains relatively stable," Alexander Deryugin wrote in his review.
Aleksandr Deryugin says that the main reason for the PIT drop is the specifics of paying taxes through the unified tax account, whereby money arrives later to the regions' accounts than before. It was reported back in February that regional and urban budgets have not received PIT payments on schedule to their accounts under the new system. As of the beginning of February, the Ministry of Finance estimated the balance of funds not distributed on time to be Rb 1 trillion. About 10 regions quickly reported the problem, said Anatoly Artamonov, Head of the Budget Committee of the Council of the Federation. According to his estimates, in order to cover the cash gap, the regions had to resort to treasury loans of Rb1.7 trillion. He also focused on the unfairness of this "event": although such loans are provided at a symbolic rate of 0.1%, it is strange that the regions have to pay for someone else's mistakes, because it is not the region's fault that the money it has already been paid is stuck somewhere in the bowels of the tax service.