Govt proposes raising top rate of ad tax from 40 pc to 50 pc

Budapest (MTI) – The government is proposing to raise the top rate of the tax on advertising revenue from 40 percent to 50 percent, an economy ministry official told a parliamentary committee on Wednesday.

Zoltan Pankucsi, deputy state secretary in charge of taxation and accounting, told the legislative committee that the ministry was reviewing the ad-tax rates and would then decide on raising the top bracket.

At the same time, the ministry plans to reduce the administrative burdens placed on payers of the tax.

The opposition Together (Egyutt) said in a statement that by raising the “penalty tax” the government is admitting to treating independent media — especially RTL Klub — as an enemy, which is not tied to “Fidesz’s propaganda machine”.

The Association of Hungarian Newspaper Publishers (MLE) urged lawmakers not to pass the bill on raising the ad tax. “If the tax hike is approved it would lead to falling standards and a univocal, skewed public sphere,” the MLE said in a statement. The raised tax would trigger lower spending on content creation as well as having an impact on labour-market positions, it added.

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters