The Hungarian parliament prohibited the government from introducing the global minimum tax. Balázs Orbán's opinion article was published in this regard in The Wall Street Journal. Quotes from the article:
"The European Union is heading towards an economic crisis. War and sanctions are creating an unprecedented challenge: rising prices, inflation, soaring food and energy prices, supply chain disruptions. In such a situation, governments must prioritize the economic interests of their own countries and deal with the cost of living crisis. (…)
The new global minimum tax directive would hit Central European economies the most, namely by damaging the favorable tax systems that give these countries a significant competitive advantage over their Western European counterparts. The economies of the Visegrad four (Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic) have been growing continuously over the past decade. Hungary, for example, used its budgetary (fiscal) independence to create Europe's "most investment-friendly" environment - with easily accessible locations, a skilled workforce, an investor-friendly legal environment, state incentives, a low (9 percent) corporate tax and an effective rate of 7.5 percent. In 2021, our country thus achieved a foreign investment of 5.9 billion euros, which is considered a record.(...)
In this looming economic crisis, it is therefore essential that Hungary be able to shape its own budget policy. To protect our competitiveness and sovereignty, the Hungarian parliament prohibited the government from introducing a global minimum tax."
Source: Mandarin
Image: MTI
