Most for Top Earners – VG

This is indicated in the government’s own distribution table in the state budget for 2021:

– 78 percent of taxpayers will receive lower taxes next year, writes Finance Minister Jan Tore Sanner (H) in the draft national budget.

This makes budget changes with your finances.

But the government doesn’t hide who gets the most relief:

– Measured in crowns, it is still the highest earners who get the most tax relief. This is primarily due to the fact that the increase in the valuation discount for stocks and fixed assets results in a lower estate tax, Sanner writes.

Watch VGTV’s live stream on the state budget here:

NOK 200 in tax relief for the underpaid

The distribution table shows that those who earn less than NOK 100,000 receive NOK 200 on average. This applies to nearly 400,000 people, the largest group in the government’s overview.

The relief is somewhat higher the more you receive in gross income: For those who earn between 500,000 kronor and 1 million kronor, the Solberg government’s tax relief is between 500 and 800 kroner.

The almost 300,000 taxpayers with more than one million crowns of gross income receive an average relief of 3400 crowns. The great impact is due to the fact that the government reduced the valuation of the shares in the wealth tax.

The Government highlights that several of the proposals that apply to personal income tax are not included in the distribution calculations.

These include the increase in the limit for tax-free gifts, the tax exemption for employer-funded influenza vaccine, and a higher tax-free benefit for employees.
purchase of shares at a discount in the employer’s company.

A total of 180 million in tax relief for the insured

The Ministry of Finance has also published figures of tax changes for some individual groups:

** Self-employed persons receive approximately NOK 130 million in total aid, an average relief of approximately NOK 1,300. Of this, NOK 900 is a reduction in wealth tax.

The state budget for 1–2–3

** Retirees receive total tax relief of approximately NOK 600 million. This corresponds to an average tax relief of around NOK 600, of which NOK 200 can be attributed to wealth tax relief.

** Policyholders receive a total tax relief of almost NOK 180 million. This corresponds to an average tax relief of around NOK 400, of which the wealth tax relief amounts to NOK 50.

Harsh criticism

– With this budget, it will be cheaper to be one of the richest and more expensive to be sick, but the leader of the Labor Party, Jonas Gahr Støre, told VGTV about the proposed state budget.

The move they are making on the estate tax is to cut back for people who own stocks, he believes.

– Everything will work out, says Jan Tore Sanner, but the question is for whom? Støre asks.

Center Party leader Trygve Slagsvold Vedum also criticizes the fact that the wealth tax cut benefits those who already earn better.

– What kind of policy is this? That the ones who already have the most money in the first place are the ones who will get the big tax cuts? It is bad right-wing politics and it is not Norwegian, it rages.

SV policy Kari Elisabeth Kaski says the climate strategy in the state budget is not enough and not enough is being done to achieve climate goals. However, she believes that tax cuts are the biggest problem in this year’s budget proposal.

“We want climate emissions to drop, differences to drop and the government to disappear,” says Kaski.

Sanner: This has a normal family.

But Jan Tore Sanner argues that it really does give wide tax cuts to the proposed state budget:

– We reduce the step tax in the lower steps and increase the minimum deduction. This means that a normal family can receive between NOK 1,000 and 2,000 tax relief, and around NOK 600 on average for a normal income. During these eight years, an ordinary family leaves with 14,000 kronor extra compared to the tax scheme of the red greens, says the finance minister to VG.

It says that other mechanisms of the economy contribute to equalization:

– What creates inequality? The parts on the left blindly stare at the protocol of the equation. We believe that investing in education, skills and getting more people to work is the most important thing to reduce inequality. Therefore, the most important thing next year is that we create and guarantee more jobs, says Jan Tore Sanner.

In his press conference Wednesday, Sanner was asked about the opposition’s harsh criticism of the tax system:

– It is not uncommon for harsh words to be used when presenting the budget. I’ve heard such harsh words before, he says.