With the reform to the law on Tax Concentration non-resident investors in the country will have to pay 15% instead of 10% on income earned from capital.
According to Juan Sebastian Chamorro, executive director of the Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development, the new reform "... is a positive thing for the country because it will generate an increase in the collection of such taxes but is a negative blow to natural and legal non residents because the Revenue Department will no longer deduct 10% on capital transfers, but rather 15 %. "
The argument is that the tax on cement will increase the cost of housing by at least 6% and the tax on phones will directly affect users of prepaid telephone lines.
From a statement issued by the Chamber of Industry of Guatemala:
The Chamber of Industry of Guatemala emphasizes that even though it promptly denounced the risk of lack of transparency and accountability of the state budget for Fiscal Year 2015, it has been approved and will lead to negative impacts on the population.
A A bill presented in Costa Rica aims to improve tax controls by forcing merchants to accept payments with credit and debit cards.
The bill introduced in the Legislature by the Ministry of Finance, entitled "An Act to improve the fight against fiscal fraud" includes other initiatives such as the imposition of a sales tax on property rentals of less than one month duration.
The private sector is opposed to the conditions in the third reform package the outgoing government intends to implement, claiming that state expenditures should be reduced first.
More control of public spending and no new taxes are the demands from employers to the government, which aims to increase government revenues with a third reform and the issuance of $800 million in bonds.
The Government has abolished the regulations of the Tax Coalition Law which created new taxes and fiscal measures.
Jose Adam Aguerri, head of the Superior Council of Private Enterprise announced that the regulations on the Tax Coalition Law will be canceled by the Government of the country.
"President Daniel Ortega signed an order repealing the controversial decree 06-2014 containing the regulations.
The union of private enterprises in Nicaragua is opposing the amendment to the Law on Tax Coalition.
The Superior Council of Private Enterprise showed its opposition to the reform of the Law on Tax Coalition. The head of the union, José Adán Aguerri said "we will file a constitutional appeal against decree 06-2014, and amendments and additions to this Law, published last week."
In 2010, when looking at total tax revenue as a percentage of GDP, Costa Rica has the highest ratio in Central America, and ranked fourth in Latin America, behind only Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay.
The study on Tax Statistics in Latin America, by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), notes that while the ratio of tax revenue to GDP has been growing in Latin American countries, the average of the so called "tax pressure" is still below the average for countries who are members of the OECD.
Costa Rican industrialists believe the VAT exemption proposed by the Executive will be ineffective.
A press release from the Costa Rica Chamber of Industry states:
Surprised. This was the reaction of industrialists on learning of the filing of an amendment to the Solidarity Tax Act Project by the Ministry of the Economy and Ministry of Finance, relating to value added tax.
If many large companies are granted tax exemptions for long periods of time, why not give the same exemptions to SMEs?
The analysis of the topic in an article in Laprensa.hn on the high rate of informality in microenterprises in Honduras, can be extrapolated to all Central American countries.
"Figures from the deputy minister for micro, small and medium businesses indicate that of the approximately 297.000 companies that fall under the micro category, 60% remain in the informal sector, mainly due to tax burdens they would have to face in order to take that step. "
A critical view of the simplistic methods used in calculating the tax burden that supports an economy.
When analyzing a tax reform proposal, the first argument considered is what is the percentage of taxes collected by the state in relation to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country.
Juan Carlos Hidalgo, on his blog at Elfinancierocr.com, shows with solid arguments, the fallacy of comparing, without thorough analysis, the public figures of the ratio of tax revenue to GDP, which leads to erroneous conclusions which usually hide the main problem: the spending inefficiency demonstrated by the state with the money collected through taxes.