Fiscal Burden Approaching New High
The average tax burden in the 30 member states of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in 2006 came close to the all-time maximum, recorded in 2000. The spike in taxation came after several years of decreasing taxes in most OECD member states. In Great Britain, for example, the tax burden in 2000 was 37.2 percent of the GDP. It had fallen to 35.6 percent by 2004, then hit a new high of 37.4 percent in 2006. In Sweden, those indicators were 52.6, 49.9 and 50.1 percent, respectively. In the United States, they were 29.9, 26 and 28.2 percent, respectively.
Since the beginning of recordkeeping in 1990, Sweden has had the highest tax rate, with 50.1 percent of the GDP. It is followed by Denmark with 49 percent, Belgium with 44.8 percent and France with 44.5 percent. The lowest tax rate in the OECD is in Mexico with 20.6 percent. Taxpayers in South Korea (26.2%), Greece (27.4%) and the U.S. (28.2%) have reason to be glad as well. The tax rate is rising slowly in South Korea and Mexico, but the rate in the U.S. is still below the 2000 level of 29.9 percent.
The tax rate in Russia is changing similarly to that in the OECD states. In 2000, the tax burden was 35.1 percent of the GDP. In 2004, after a reduction of basic taxes, the rate equaled 33.7 percent of the GDP, rising in 2006 to 36.5 percent. The cause of that dynamics is different in Russia from the OECD states, however. In the European Union, the tax increase was due to larger social expenditures made by leftist governments. In Russia, the government prefers to explain the rising rate exclusively as a result of rising world oil prices from 2005 to 2007.
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All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 22, 2007
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