The European Union is considering the possibility of bypass Hungary's veto which currently prevents the introduction of the global minimum tax, the minimum 15% tax on the profits of multinational corporations worldwide. The finance ministers meeting in Prague on Friday and Saturday could issue a joint statement on the alternatives that would exclude Budapest, said Nadia Calvino, Spain's economy minister, adding that Madrid "strongly supports all initiatives to establish a minimum tax rate for big companies".
The 2021 agreement on the Global Minimum Tax
As of July 2021, she had been signed an agreement between 130 countries on global minimum tax. But then the political frictions within the European Union cast a shadow on the real possibilities of carrying out the project, which is already very complicated on a technical level (the greatest difficulties concern the rules that determine which nations must tax digital multinationals).
Hungary's veto
Before Hungary's last-minute veto last June, the EU was close to agreeing on a harmonized implementation that would have created a minimum effective corporate tax of 15%. But then Budapest withdrew its support, arguing that a new tax burden in the context of the war could be "fatal" for manufacturing companies and would be detrimental to EU competitiveness. In this way the launch of the global minimum tax in Europe it has become bogged down, because the adoption of fiscal rules, according to Community law, provides for the unanimous vote of the States.
The “enhanced cooperation” hypothesis
But an alternative exists. To overcome the Hungarian obstacle, the French finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, proposes a path envisaged by European rules, that of the "enhanced cooperation” among a limited number of states: “Now is the time to make this decision – remarked Le Maire – We should not talk, we should decide”.
The work of Germany
Meanwhile Christian Lindner, German finance minister, has made it known that the Berlin government has already begun to prepare a national legislation which could be taken as a model: "We strongly support the European approach - underlined Lindner - We try to convince all the Member States, in particular one, but if no agreement is reached, Germany will decide anyway to implement the global minimum tax. And I think other countries have a similar approach as well.”
SECURITY UPDATE TRAINING
Italy has signed a joint commitment with 4 other euro area countries – France, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain – to implement the global agreement on minimum corporate taxation from next year which had been reached at the G20 and OECD level. "It is a crucial lever for greater justice through a more effective fight against tax evasion and optimization", reads the document also signed by the Minister of Economy, Daniele Franco. The commitment was launched during the informal meetings of the Eurogroup and Ecofin in Prague and plans to proceed even if an agreement is not reached at EU level.
