The business sector in Negros Oriental praised President Duterte for spearheading tax reforms in the country one of which is the lowering of corporate and personal income tax as well as relaxing the bank secrecy laws.
Negros Oriental Chamber of Commerce & Industry President Edward Du said this is good news for businesses especially for the micro, small and medium scale industries which constitute 99 percent of the country’s economy, while only one percent is considered as large taxpayers who can readily afford to pay the 30 percent income tax.
According to the NOCCI President, businessmen are pushing for the Singapore model especially for micro small and medium scale industries to entice them to invest more because they can already afford to pay a lower corporate which is 15 percent, the lowest in the ASEAN region.
However, Duterte did not mention in his State of the Nation Address how much is the reduction of the individual and corporate tax.
Under the proposal, sprouting of small businesses is expected at the same time address the existence of the underground economy because of the lowering of the corporate tax.
At present, NOCCI believes that the 30 percent corporate tax is not fair to the micro, small and medium scale industries because both the small ones including the “carinderia” and the large players pay the same corporate tax. (PNA)
