Brasília, June 26, 2003 (Agência Brasil - ABr) - Even though the Minister of Finance, Antônio Palocci, assured that there will be no increase in the tax burden, Brazilian entrepreneurs are still skeptical about limitations on taxes, which currently amount to 36%. In a meeting with industrialists, the Minister affirmed that the Administration discovered a novel solution to avoid raising taxes, after a decade of policies that worked in the opposite direction. According to Palocci, the government, for the first time, calculated its expenses based on budget cuts, instead of transferring the problem to owners of businesses and the population. "For the first time in 10 years, the readjustment of the budget was not based upon increasing the tax burden, but, rather, on reductions in expenses by the government itself," the Minister explained.
For Jorge Gerdau, a businessman who was one of the industrial leaders that presented a manifesto Wednesday (25) to the presidents of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, João Paulo Cunha (PT-SP) and José Sarney (PMDB-AP), with suggestions for tax reform, the atmosphere is not yet one of insecurity, because the rates have still not been determined by the states. "In the state government sphere, things have not been defined. The risk exists that rates will be leveled up to whoever charges the most," Gerdau explained. He said that the entrepreneurs suggested to the Minister that the Senate play a regulatory role, to bar changes that increase the tax burden, a task currently performed by the Fiscal Policy Council (Confaz).
The manifesto was delivered yesterday at a ceremony attended by around 300 entrepreneurial leaders, as well as representatives of the productive sector who staged a kind of "procession on the Esplanade" to present their demands to the Congress and the Executive Power.
The manifesto, which also discussed the piling up of tax collections, upholds the maintenance of the Provisional Contribution on Financial Transactions (CPMF, the "check tax"), but with a reduction to 0.08%. In the industrialists' strategic view, Brazil should avoid cumulative taxes, aligning the conception of the CPMF with those of the Social Integration Program (PIS) and the Contribution to Finance Social Security (Cofins), which have undergone a transformation. (DAS)
