Tax Compliance Costs of Business Taxpayers in Croatia

The paper presents results of our research in tax compliance costs (TCC) of business units in Croatia in the period 2001/2002. Our focus was on all currently applicable taxes (except custom duties and excise duties): personal income tax paid by owners of business units that pay personal income tax, company (corporate) income tax (in Croatia called "profit tax"), value added tax (VAT) and wage taxes together with social security contributions. Our research addressed two different groups of business taxpayers: business units that pay personal income tax and business units that pay profit tax. It was made in the form of an interview survey (face to face). As expected, the conclusion of our research is that TCC have a regressive effect over the entire size range of business units, even for the smallest business units. The percentage of business taxpayers TCC in GDP is 2.1%. The share of personal income tax compliance costs in the relevant tax revenues is extremely high (almost 100%), indicating the need of having self-assessment replaced with lump sum (estimated) tax. The psychological costs of that tax do not seem to be high. The share of profit tax compliance costs is also considerable (12%), indicating the need of simplifying the profit tax calculation. The share of VAT compliance costs is satisfying (6%), but very high for business units that pay personal income tax (almost 25%), showing the need of a higher exemption threshold