The Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire proposed Monday evening to devote a share of future income from corporate tax to the repayment of the large public debt generated by the health crisis.
Read also: Covid debt: no return to European budgetary discipline before 2023
"
If tomorrow (...) companies return to growth, have additional growth, and therefore corporate tax revenues increase, would it not be efficient, would it be? Would it not be fair to devote part of the increase in this corporate tax (...) to the repayment of the Covid debt?
“Asked the minister during a debate on the debt in the National Assembly.
"
We have enabled companies to resist this crisis
", he justified, thanks to aid mobilized by the State to support them, such as the solidarity fund, loans guaranteed by the State or partial unemployment.
"
The companies will give back what they have managed to obtain thanks to the protection of the State
", insisted Bruno Le Maire, adding that "
it is a fair and effective solution which deserves in any case to be studied
" .
No creation of a new tax
The health crisis caused public debt to jump to around 120% of gross domestic product (GDP) last year, generating an additional € 215 billion in public debt.
A part, 75 billion, concerns social organizations, and must already be confined via the Social Debt Redemption Fund (Cades), and reimbursed thanks to the extension of the CRDS (a levy on salaries), according to the existing system for pre-Covid social debt clearance.
This new debt must be confined, isolated, affirmed Bruno Le Maire, "
for the sake of transparency
", but without allocating a new resource to it which would amount to creating a new tax.
The question of the sustainability of this debt and its repayment is the subject of heated debate, with some economists and elected officials defending its partial cancellation.
Bruno Le Maire again opposed such an idea, deeming it "
dangerous
" and "
unnecessary
".
To reimburse her, he repeated his refusal to increase taxes.
On the other hand, it counts on the revival of growth and on "
structural reforms
", such as that of pensions, for the moment pending.
He also again proposed a reform of the governance of public finances, with the establishment of a multi-year expenditure rule, for example over 5 years.
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Covid debt: who will pay?
