VINCENTIANS TO GET TAX BREAK THIS CHRISTMAS

Santa “De Comrade” Claus is bringing Vincentians a tax break this Christmas.

The non-taxable threshold of $14,000 per year is expected to move upward, and the company tax, down from its present rate of 40 percent of gross profits.

But just what the new rates will be, Vincentians will have to wait until Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves presents his Budget on Monday, December 11.{{more}}

As he gave a sneak peak into his budgetary bag of goodies

on a radio call-in programme earlier this week and without being specific, he told one caller that he intended to honour his commitment of raising the threshold on taxable income to $17,000 by the year 2010. He also reminded listeners that when his Government took office in 2001 it was $12,000.

“If the economy continues to grow at the rate that I am

expecting, it may even go up to $20,000,” Prime Minister Gonsalves said.

It costs the government $2.2 million to cushion the effect of each $1,000 rise in the taxable income threshold, Dr Gonsalves told listeners.

Mum was also the word on the exact figure of the company tax rate ease.

“I am not going to reveal actual numbers but I will think you could rely on me, within the framework of the numbers that I have been articulating,” he said.