DOF tax plan gains support

Despite the unpopularity in Congress of the Department of Finance’s tax policy reform program, especially the provisions removing senior citizen’s value-added tax exemption and raising oil excise, the proposal gained support from two multilateral agencies.

Also, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III said the Duterte administration was not forgetting the plight of the poor elderly, as next year’s budget even increased the allocation for their social pensions.

Allocation

The proposed P3.35-trillion 2017 national budget more than doubled to P17.9 billion the allocation for indigent senior citizens from P8.7 billion this year  as the minimum qualifying age for the P500 monthly subsidy was lowered to 60 from 77.

If approved by Congress, the budget would double the number of beneficiaries to 2.8 million senior citizens from 1.4 million at present.

In a statement, the DOF said the Coalition of Services for the Elderly Inc. (Cose) “shared Dominguez’s assessment that assistance for indigent seniors would be better served through targeted subsidies, rather than providing them VAT exemptions when dining out, which mostly only rich seniors enjoy.”

No pension

“Our group is pushing a universal social pension because the targeted ones were indigents … If we look at it, more than 50 percent of the population don’t have pension at all so the need is there,” the DOF quoted Cose project coordinator Aura Sevilla as saying.

The DOF’s proposed tax policy reform program also gained support from the International Monetary Fund, which said last month “it supports the authorities’ push for a comprehensive tax policy reform that is net revenue positive with due attention paid to equity.”

The World Bank also backs the comprehensive tax reform, especially moves to increase the excise slapped on oil products.