"Wealth tax could be unconstitutional."
Eugenio Simón Acosta, Full Professor of Tax Law at the University of Navarra, defends a "moderate" Wealth Tax.
According to Eugenio Simón Acosta, Full Professor of Tax Law at the University of Navarra, "the Wealth Tax that the Government intends to recover could be unconstitutional if it is processed by means of a royal decree-law, since it cannot significantly affect the rights, duties and fundamental freedoms of the citizen, as is the case with the obligation to contribute to the support of the State through taxes".
This is what the specialist has defended today on the occasion of the opening of the new academic year at the University of Navarra, where he has been in charge of giving the inaugural lecture "Tax justice in property taxation".
As he has clarified, "this unconstitutionality -recognized in the article 86- could be found, therefore, in the way of recovering this tax through a decree law".
In this sense, the professor said he was in favor of a moderate Wealth tax, but not as a reissue of the one that already existed in 2008, "but as a restructuring of the entire wealth tax that replaces taxes of a medieval nature, such as the transfer tax and the intra-family inheritance tax".
In addition, the wealth tax, which is added to the personal income tax, "should be able to be paid with the income generated by that asset, otherwise it would not be worthwhile to maintain an estate. That is to say, in that status our assets would have a value equal to zero and the tax would be confiscatory".
1,000 million euros
For the professor of the School of Law of the University of Navarra, this reform is "hasty, since in Spain there should be a political and social background discussion to establish a fair, effective and long term tax system deadline". "In fact", he continued, "the 1,000 million euros that it seems that it will raise do not solve the problem of the State deficit".
Eugenio Simón Acosta also reminded that the tax should not consume income: "Very high taxes erode the instructions and at some point the collection may be lower despite the fact that the rates are raised, so that the State is not interested in its imposition".
Finally, he clarified that the tax should be established in a similar way in all the autonomous communities, "to avoid movements of citizens depending on the place where they have to pay the least tax".
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