Goerdeler Commission

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The Goerdeler Commission (officially: Commission for the Improvement of Tax Conditions for Investments and Jobs ) was an expert commission set up in 1990 by the Federal Ministry of Finance , which took on the development of a corporate tax reform.

proposals

In its 1991 report, it proposed a fundamental reduction in corporate income tax (for retained earnings, so-called retention) and income tax (top tax rate of 46 percent). It also recommended the abolition of the trade capital tax , which represents the wealth-related part of trade tax , as well as the abolition of the trade tax apportionment , the wealth tax and the unit valuation . The tax base for trade tax should be halved to 2.5 percent (including all interest). The commission also provided for a coupling of the rates of assessment for business tax and property tax . Other building sites were improving old-age provision for the self-employed, avoiding double taxation of foreign profits and optimizing conversion tax . The report considered it necessary to expand the tax base and reduce property tax revenue by 20 percent for financing purposes.

Result and aftermath

As a result, the proposals were not wanted by politicians and were difficult to implement.

The Börsen-Zeitung wrote in 2006:

"If politics had followed the recommendations of the" Goerdeler Commission "set up by the Federal Minister of Finance and named after its chairman: the Federal Constitutional Court would have been spared some work, tax law would be simpler and, above all, more efficient than today, and it would be economic and thus economic investment-friendly. "

The tax index fell to 3.5 percent only after the corporate tax reform in 2008 . The wealth tax has not been levied since 1997 and the trade capital tax was finally repealed on January 1, 1998 by the law to continue the corporate tax reform of October 29, 1997 (Federal Law Gazette I 2590).

Members

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Expert Council for the Assessment of Overall Economic Development (Ed.): Economic Integration in Germany: Perspectives, Paths, Risks. Annual report 1991/92. Metzler-Poeschel, Stuttgart 1991, ISBN 978-3-8246-0086-1 , p. 148.
  2. ^ Brigitte Knobbe-Keuk : Accounting and corporate tax law. 9th edition, Verlag Dr. Otto Schmidt, Cologne 1993, ISBN 3-504-20067-7 , p. 973.
  3. ^ Rainer Bossert: Corporate taxation and accounting tax law. Basics of corporate income and corporate taxation. Physica-Verlag, Heidelberg 1997, ISBN 978-3-7908-1005-9 , p. 2.
  4. ↑ Reinhard Goerdeler . In: Börsen-Zeitung , January 9, 1996, p. 7.