Courts set to hear case of self-employed
Self-employed professionals are set to challenge the constitutionality of the new method of taxing their incomes on the basis of presumed revenues.
In an event held on Wednesday, their coordinating committee decided to jointly appeal to the courts. The event was attended by Greece’s former president Prokopis Pavlopoulos and former deputy prime minister Evangelos Venizelos, both constitutional law experts who noted several problems with the legislation, which is already in force.
According to Pavlopoulos, the provisions of the law violate the constitution in several ways. “With this law the state declares the Greek tax system ‘bankrupt.’ It admits its inability to collect taxable material. It makes the self-employed guilty of misrepresentation by definition and on that basis attempts to rationalize a tax system where the greatest evasion comes from anyone other than these self-employed,” he said.
Venizelos spoke about the discrimination against the economically weak: “The audits are not aimed at the biggest potential taxpayers, but at those who do not meet the presumption and dare challenge it,” he said.
