NewsWhore
11-16-2006, 01:50 PM
Lawyer Marisol Vicens Bello comments on Tuesday night's speech by President Leonel Fernandez in her opinion piece in El Caribe today. She observes that the speech concentrated on justifying the continued tax adjustments and denying the increase in spending, and on explaining how they would obtain the RD$35 million - 50% from new taxes and 50% from government spending cuts.
She mentions that President Fernandez argued that the tax adjustment is necessary as a consequence of what he described as "an act of malice" by the last Congress that did not authorize sufficient tax increases in the last reform. "The strategy was to make the reform appear light compared to the menu of options that had been leaked to the press," she writes.
She disputes that there was a "rectification," commenting that of the seven measures announced, only one - expansion of items to be taxed by ITBIS (VAT) -- had not been passed by Congress, which instead compensated by increasing income tax from 28 to 30% and adding an ad-valorem on fuel. It is not true that the changes in taxes on tobacco and alcohol were agreed on, nor a 5% tax on hotels, nor 10% on insurance, nor increases in income taxes, nor tax on checking and bank transfers. Furthermore, she mentions that the increase of 1% to 2% of the luxury tax on real estate had not been agreed upon either.
She also questions the announcement of new austerity measures given that these have not been met since they were first touted in the President's inaugural speech. She comments that the President was vague about where the proposed cuts in superfluous spending would be made.
"That is why we understand that this is not about rectification nor austerity, and neither has any measure been taken to contain the hemorrhaging of the subsidies on electricity and propane gas; we will continue on the road of increasing taxes and the constant irrational increase of government spending.
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#3)
She mentions that President Fernandez argued that the tax adjustment is necessary as a consequence of what he described as "an act of malice" by the last Congress that did not authorize sufficient tax increases in the last reform. "The strategy was to make the reform appear light compared to the menu of options that had been leaked to the press," she writes.
She disputes that there was a "rectification," commenting that of the seven measures announced, only one - expansion of items to be taxed by ITBIS (VAT) -- had not been passed by Congress, which instead compensated by increasing income tax from 28 to 30% and adding an ad-valorem on fuel. It is not true that the changes in taxes on tobacco and alcohol were agreed on, nor a 5% tax on hotels, nor 10% on insurance, nor increases in income taxes, nor tax on checking and bank transfers. Furthermore, she mentions that the increase of 1% to 2% of the luxury tax on real estate had not been agreed upon either.
She also questions the announcement of new austerity measures given that these have not been met since they were first touted in the President's inaugural speech. She comments that the President was vague about where the proposed cuts in superfluous spending would be made.
"That is why we understand that this is not about rectification nor austerity, and neither has any measure been taken to contain the hemorrhaging of the subsidies on electricity and propane gas; we will continue on the road of increasing taxes and the constant irrational increase of government spending.
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#3)