As soon as one has an income above EUR 41 360, the tax rate is 50% and no longer increases. Wouldn’t it make sense to keep increasing the tax rate further? Why stop at bracket 4? Where’s bracket 5, 6, 7, …?

24 comments

  1. If you make more than 41000 euro annually and you aren’t working with a bookkeeper to minimise your taxes, you are stupid anyway.

    Pretty sure there isn’t much to gain by doing that.

  2. These brackets are pretty shit for working people in general. It’d be much better for upward mobility to have something like

    0-20k = 0%

    20k-30k = 20%

    30k-40k = 30%

    40k-50k = 40%

    50k-70k = 50%

    70k + = 60%

    Just make me dictator for a day 🙃 I’ll fix this country

  3. You’re already taxed at an effective rate of 57.5% for every Euro you make above 41,360… and every euro you spend is also taxed indirectly via VAT.

    You want *more* taxes?!

  4. Well, the people deciding these things would fall in those brackets… a politician cutting in his own flesh… you are way to optimistic for a belgian:)

  5. Because, if you tax rich people at insanely high tax rates a lot of them will say screw it and not pay or move somewhere else, then instead of getting the 60 – 70 – 80% … that you want, you get 0.

  7. Ignoring for a minute how unfair it would be, objectively at some point if you start increasing taxes too much, the state will actually start earning less tax income, because the cost of avoiding or evading taxes is less than the actual taxes that you’re avoiding.

    If it costs €5000 to avoid €4000 in taxes, you’re not going to do it. But if for the same €5000 you can avoid €8000 in taxes, it makes a lot of sense to try harder to avoid them, so now instead of earning €8000 in taxes the state is earning €0.

    This not just on an individual level, but companies will start accommodating tax avoidance more and more as well in order to attract top talent. Think: company cars etc.

  9. Because the people who decide on those rules make +41.360€?
    Fragmentje uit artikel ‘Belgische politieke partijen nooit rijker dan vandaag.’
    van De Standaard , 27 Juli 2022

    “De Belgische politieke partijen bezaten eind 2021 samen een nettovermogen van 156,8 miljoen euro, veruit het hoogste bedrag ooit. Dat is een stijging van meer dan een zesde tegenover 2020, toen ging het om 133,5 miljoen euro. Dat blijkt uit een analyse die De Standaard maakte van de jaarrekeningen van de partijen die deze maand door de Kamer werden gepubliceerd. In 1999 bedroeg het gezamenlijke vermogen nog 56,4 miljoen euro, een cijfer gecorrigeerd voor de inflatie. In iets meer dan twintig jaar tijd werden de politieke partijen dus bijna drie keer zo rijk. De cijfers tonen opnieuw aan dat ze zichzelf subsidiëren tot ­vermogensbeheerders.”

    “De bedragen zijn onder meer een gevolg van de overheidsdotaties die afhankelijk zijn van het verkiezingsresultaat en die in vergelijking met andere Europese landen extreem gul zijn. In totaal ontvingen de Belgische partijen in 2021 75,2 miljoen euro aan subsidies, eveneens een recordbedrag. In 2020 ging het nog om 73,6 miljoen euro.”

    Sure feels nice paying that electricity bill, or hearing Jambon say “LOL renters BTFO”.

  12. I hope to fuck you’re not giving anyone in Brussels any ideas.

    You know with the remaining shit after 50% we still pay 21% btw on everything right? And a swat of other taxes and mandatory shit.

    Why would you even thing we need more taxes? I’m curious. Because “evil rich” people?

  13. They should do this, but move the numbers. Under 13540 no taxes, 13540-41360 10%, 41360-70k: 25%, etc. Never go above 50% though, as people will be moving away.

  15. For every €100 gross I get extra right now I get about €43 (even less because of municipal tax). I don’t think we need to raise taxes, we need to limit spending and even make the tax brackets wider.

  17. Both high earners and actual rich people do not have their money classified / taxed as income.

    Increasing beyond 50% will only shift the point at which point these schemes become beneficial. Unless these schemes are altered – but that’s honestly not the most important thing either.

    We should increase the brackets to make them more progressive. But just adding more brackets with a higher tax rate honestly won’t change much. It’s already bypassed.

  18. I always liked that meme that said ‘if you reach xxxx euro you get an award saying you won capitalism and the rest of your money will go to charity’

    Many explained reasons why taxing higher is counterproductive BUT I do feel like capitalism is fuckery and at some point the meme should become true. If you earn more money than you + your child + your child’s child + the child after + after can spend, you’re a lucky man and also very selfish lol. Money doesn’t make happiness but it sure as hell would fix a lot of problems. Like paying electricity 🤡

  22. Stop punishing people for being succesfull. We already live largely in a participation society which results in everything evolving backwards, no need to make it even worse for those who actually contribute to society and are highly succesful in doing so.

  23. I don’t know if you should have so many brackets but certainly an additional one could be interesting IF the tax rate of the first one becomes 0%. Imagine , you are receiving 0,01€ a year, still below the poverty level, and yet the state helps himself on your salary… WHY ??

  24. We are already the highest taxed (income) country in the world.

    You want to make it even worse? The current approach is already not working.

    Things like this are always about balance, but where a country like the US clearly went way too far on benefitting the rich, I think Belgium is the opposite.

    So taxes should certainly change, but not the way you want them to.

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