Source: Jornal do Commercio Brasil - RJ, 31/03/2009

Demonstrations in favor of the immediate approval of the Proposed Constitutional Amendment to Tax Reform are reappearing in the National Congress and in the press, which, however, is proving to be inopportune and ineffective. It is inopportune because, shortly after its elaboration, the economic crisis came, which, appearing in the United States, spread to Europe and other countries and reached Brazil, in the form of reduced investments, declining economic activity and unemployment. . The crisis has undoubtedly become the central concern of the government. Thus, to the market uncertainties, caused by the crisis and that discourage investors, cannot be added, at this moment, the fears and concerns that naturally result from radical changes in the tax system. The government has to focus on stimulating and investing in infrastructure and the PAC has that purpose.

The Tax Reform proposal is also ineffective. Adding 381 new rules to the Federal Constitution (the proposed Amendment is more extensive than the entire United States Constitution), the proposal, in addition to being extravagant, creates two new taxes. The first is the tax on onerous operations with goods and services, which, in fact, only replaces some contributions (Cofins, PIS and Salário-Educação), with different calculation bases (company income, taxable profit and payroll) ). The proposal replaces these calculation bases with imports, production and marketing, in addition to services, with an estimated rate of 13%, which, added to the ICMS tax (calculated, on average, at 18%), would result in an absurd incidence of 31% on the same basis of calculation, affecting the production system and commercial activities. Aside from that, the new tax, as it does in fact affect the consumer, will increase the regressivity of the system, which is anti-social.

At the same time, the Reform creates a “New ICMS”, replacing the incidence at source with the incidence at destination, which is enough to throw the revenues of States and Municipalities in the dark, in a year of economic crisis, provoking, as is and reaction of Messrs. Governors and Mayors. In addition, it attributes to the current Confaz truly legislative powers and unifies, in federal law, the legislation of the states and the Federal District, which matters - it cannot be denied - in loss of the legislative capacity of state assemblies, causing other reactions. Aside from that, the reform extinguishes CSLL, but does not prevent the increase in income tax, to compensate for the loss of revenue.

Now, in a year of economic crisis, a tax reform cannot depend on a controversial Constitutional Amendment, which does not reduce, but increases, both the tax burden and the tax bureaucracy. However, it can be initiated by two or three provisional measures. To reduce the tax burden on companies, the government could extinguish the Contribution to PIS, which is no longer intended to form workers' assets, but to finance unemployment insurance and the so-called “14th salary”, as well as the Contribution to Salary -Education, which participates in the financing of basic education, since such expenses can be met from Budget funds. And to reduce the tax burden on individuals and the regressiveness of the system, it would be enough to correct the income tax incidence table, which has been outdated for more than ten years and has turned even the best paid workers into IR taxpayers. It would be fair to halve tax fines, especially those of 50%, 100% and 150% on the amount of tax due, percentages established before the relative stability of our currency and which gave rise to a gigantic Active Debt (about R $ 1,5 billion).

The solution to the problem of the accumulation of credits (about R $ 15 billion) for export activities does not depend on a constitutional amendment. Ordinary law may authorize the assignment to third parties of credits related to Cofins and PIS, to offset past due and falling due taxes. As for ICMS credits, a similar assignment may be authorized by a complementary law, therefore, a “tax reform” is not justified just to implement the so-called “Kandir Law”.

On the other hand, the government could reduce the bureaucracy of the tax system, making taxation definitive in several cases of withholding tax, expanding the area of ​​taxation under the presumed profit regime, consolidating the federal taxes and contributions legislation and approving definitive models for IR and ITR statements, which are changed each year.

Once again, the National Confederation of Trade in Goods, Services and Tourism is manifested by the inopportunity and inefficiency, in the terms in which it was drafted, of the Tax Reform proposal underway in the National Congress and defends the immediate adoption of measures to reduce the burden tax law, regressivity and bureaucracy in our tax system.