Una mini flat tax it's a expansion of the Citizenship Income audience, plus additional expansionary measures also financed with a reform of tax expenditures and an increase in reduced VAT rates. This is the package of measures that awaits Italy with the 2020 maneuver, at least according to the research center Promethea, which released its latest Forecast Report on Wednesday.
“MINI” FLAT TAX
In particular, to paint a scenario that would allow Italy to keep the accounts in order and not fall into the infringement procedure, Prometeia simulates a 15% flat tax scheme for total family incomes under €29. The audience of beneficiaries would thus be limited to 3,6 million people, for a total cost of 4,1 billion euros, less than a third of what Matteo Salvini has promised so far, who has always spoken of "at least 15 billion".
ENLARGEMENT OF CITIZENSHIP INCOME
The research center also hypothesizes a scenario of enlargement of the audience of beneficiaries of the citizen's income, with an Isee threshold of 10.800 euros per year, with the involvement of 400 more families (1,7 million in total), for an additional expenditure of 3,1 billion euros.
INCREASE IN REDUCED VAT RATES
On the revenue side, Prometeia believes it will be difficult to avoid an increase in VAT rates and hypothesize an increase in reduced ones (from 4% to 6% and from 10% to 12%), equivalent to approximately 6 billion euro of higher revenue, which should however be accompanied by a reprogramming of expenditure for approximately 3,3 billion and a tax expenditure reform.
THE FORECASTS ON THE PERFORMANCE OF THE GDP
In this context, without robust interventions to support potential growth, Prometeia underlines that after the stagnation of 2019 (+0,1%), the expected recovery for 2020 (+0,5%) and for the 2021 (+ 0,7%) it will not be enough to reduce public debt.
Furthermore, if Italy also manages to avoid the infringement procedure for violating the debt rules this year, “any agreement with the Commission must foresee, for 2020, a budget balance in line with that of 2019 – concludes Prometeia – leading to an inevitable increase in revenue”.
