Once again, Finance Minister Winston Jordan has delivered an early Budget which should be passed before the beginning of the new year. Credit is also due to the Minister for living up to his public commitment prior to the budget that there would be no new taxes. After the criticisms he received last year, he probably thought that discretion is the better part of valour. Given the year of assessment basis for taxation, the impact of the tax reductions could only be seen in taxes that are paid on a current year basis, such as income tax collected on the PAYE basis and Value-Added Tax (VAT). In the case of the former, tax collections actually increased while in the case of VAT, there was a significant reduction. The Minister may wish to obtain from the GRA their perception of the reasons.
Budget 2018 continues the pattern of annual increases in spending and while it reports increased revenues, the deficit is now over fifty billion dollars to be financed by debt. Debt service as a percentage