The Inheritance and Donations Tax would collect triple without the downward fiscal competence of the Autonomous Communities, led by the Governments of the Popular Party (PP) of Isabel Díaz Ayuso in Madrid and Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla in Andalusia.
Researchers Isabel Micó and Roberto Ramos of the Bank of Spain have published on Tuesday A report In which they point out whether all autonomous communities withdraw the bonuses and fix the levels of the state law of the tax on inheritances, the income would increase from 0.23% of GDP (about 3,000 million) to almost 0.7% (more than 10,000 million).
“It is still pending in our country a reform of the regional financing system that corrects some of the limitations that it has shown over the last decades,” the institution's document starts. “This reform should meet the principles of sufficiency of the resources available for the autonomous communities – especially the basis of some method of calculation objective of the real expense needs of the communities (among whose competences is health, education or social services) -, fiscal co -responsibility of these in the financing of their expenses – the latter as the capacity of the regions to generate income that finance their expense – and transparency in the different parameters that They determine the functioning of the system and its evolution, ”he continues.
To contribute to this debate, economists Isabel Micó and Roberto Ramos have developed an analytical tool for inheritance and donations tax. A tribute that, since 1996, is assigned to the Autonomous Communities and on which they have normative capacity. “In particular, communities have the power to modify the tax parameters established in the state regulations that act as a reference, such as the tax scale, kinship reductions or bonuses on the fee, among others,” summary.
The Bank of Spain tool excludes Euskadi and the Foral Community of Navarra, because these communities do not belong to the common regime of the financing system and, therefore, “they lack data from the Heritage Tax, necessary for simulation.” Likewise, the tool does not quantify the part of the tax associated with donations.
Collection of inheritance and donations tax
In 2023, the income corresponding to the inheritance tax reached 0.23% of GDP in Spain, which places this tax – among those whose performance is completely transferred to the communities – as the second in terms of collection, behind the tax on patrimonial transmissions and documented legal acts (0.73% of GDP) and ahead of the assets on the assets (0.11% of GDP).
From an international perspective, the collection of the succession tax in Spain in 2023 was above that observed in the average of the countries of the European Union (EU), 0.15% of GDP. In particular, it was similar to that of Germany and Denmark, and stood below that of France and Belgium (0.8% and 0.6% of GDP, respectively), countries that lead the collection of the EU in this area.
From a regional perspective, the collection data of the inheritance tax in Spain reveal the existence of differences between communities. In 2023, the highest income corresponded to Illes Balears, followed by the Principality of Asturias, Catalonia and La Rioja, all of them with a collection above 0.3% of its GDP. At the other extreme, Extremadura, Andalusia and the Region of Murcia obtained the lower levels of collection, below 0.15% of GDP. Madrid stays slightly above that last level. “It should be noted that, as of the first years of this century, regional governments have actively exercised their normative (downward) capacity on the Corporation Tax,” according to the Bank of Spain report.
Inheritance tax reform proposals
The investigators of the Bank of Spain propose several reforms of the inheritance tax to increase their collection. Among them, withdraw the bonuses from the tax quotas. “The collection increase of the first reform, in absolute terms, would be explained primarily by the Community of Madrid, because said region has largely bonus the tax fee of the inheritance tax,” observes the report.
Beyond the regional financing, the question of inheritances is key because it is one of the main causes that explains the inequality of wealth. According to the data presented in this report, the weight of the inheritance in GDP has increased considerably in our country since the end of the 20th century, to exceed 3% – only taking into account the transmission of real estate properties (mainly housing, and rustic or urban solar farms) -, a maximum of another era.
The inequality of wealth is being aggravated by the accumulation of properties, its financing and revaluation (price increase) uncontrolled, and this gap conditions the opportunities and well -being of people as it happened in stages of history far away. Seen otherwise, salaries and productive work are increasingly irrelevant in our society to guarantee the same opportunities, it is born in the family in which it is born.
