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THE Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) said value-added
tax (VAT) collections in October dropped from last year.
The bureau collected P11.4
billion that month, or 4.3 percent below the P11.92 billion
generated last year.
But in the first 10 months,
collections were 4 percent higher at P121.17 billion from last
year’s P116.37 billion.
In the final three months of the
year, the BIR is expected to collect at least P56.43 billion to meet
the VAT collection target of P177.6 billion, or a 26- percent
increase from last year’s P141 billion.
The BIR expects individual VAT
payers this year to increase by 38.5 percent to 529,512, while the
number of corporate payers is also expected to rise 21 percent to
346,271.
The agency is under pressure to
increase collection because it contributes around 70 percent of the
government’s tax revenues.
The inter-agency Development and
Budget Coordinating Committee has retained the agency’s
P765.8-billion overall collection target for this year.
In the third quarter, the
BIR continued to miss its collection target for VAT, which fell 29.1
percent as collections reached P109.8 billion.
Under Republic Act 9337, the
government raised the VAT rate to 12 percent for three years to
enable it to balance its budget next year.
Two senators have proposed bills
bringing back the VAT rate to 10 percent.
Senate Bill 24 proposed the
repeal of the Expanded VAT law, cutting the rate by 20 percent.
--Chino S. Leyco
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