The dilemma faced by property tax

Although the property tax has been put forward and put on the agenda by the State Council for five or six years, the debate on how to levy the property tax has never stopped. However, so far, most people in the industry believe that it is difficult to levy property tax in a short time. To sum up, the difficulties in levying property tax mainly include the following aspects:

Property and land ownership and land system reform

The first thing to face in collecting property tax is the ownership of real estate and the land it is attached to. Because property tax is a kind of property tax in nature, the purpose is to preserve and increase the value of the property held by taxpayers. Because of this, taxpayers are willing to pay taxes. Its premise is the preservation and appreciation of property, and the basis of expropriation is the privatization of property and land. In China, land is state-owned, and buyers have only 70 years of property rights. In other words, the assets of the real estate we buy depreciate with the increase of time. From this point of view, the foundation of levying property tax in China is not solid. If we want to levy property tax in accordance with international practice, we must establish a reasonable land system, properly handle the problem of real estate and its land ownership, and make a breakthrough in the current land transfer system. Such as bidding, auction and hanging forms, land transfer fee system and so on. The reform of land circulation system will inevitably involve local finance and short-term interests, and even anti-corruption issues. Therefore, this will be one of the main problems affecting the collection of property tax.

Property tax taxes the existing real estate industry and individuals.

In addition to property and land ownership, the collection of property tax also has a great impact on the current tax system. How to link the levy of property tax with the current fiscal and taxation system? How to combine the land transfer fee, property tax, land value-added tax and other taxes and fees and convert them into the property tax levied at the stage of real estate ownership? What is the standard for collecting property tax, and how to distinguish different properties? It is difficult to define these standards according to geographical location, apartment size, number of apartments owned or property value. Because only houses in our country can be divided into low-rent housing, affordable housing, unit housing, demolition housing, self-built housing, fund-raising housing, two-limited housing, commercial housing, new rural reconstruction housing, shed-to-shed housing, municipal construction housing and a series of houses sharing different policies. And how to evaluate the value of these properties with great differences in policy basis and collect property tax? It is impossible to set different tax rates for different houses, resulting in dozens of different tax treatments. Moreover, from the perspective of residents, most of the houses in the core city are old houses in the 1970s or 1980s or 1990s. Although these houses are small in size, poor in quality and poor in environment, they are well located and relatively valuable. Owners should pay property tax according to law, but these small houses and old houses are low-income people, and many people don't even have jobs. How can we ensure the payment of property tax? There are also some houses that farmers who have entered the city because of urbanization demand compensation in kind. They got a big house according to the standard of 40 to 50 square meters per capita, but they may not even have a stable job. If it is levied according to the per capita area, it is obviously difficult ... There are still many similar problems.

In addition, judging from the policies of some countries to reduce personal income tax when citizens buy houses, the government has the responsibility and obligation to solve the housing problem of citizens, so citizens are encouraged to solve the housing problem through reducing personal income tax, which is also the reason for levying property tax. However, China has not implemented the policy of reducing or offsetting individual income tax.

It is precisely because of the above factors that the real estate tax faces great difficulties in the specific operation. In this regard, the author believes that the collection of property tax is a change from circulation to holding. In the long run, it is not only conducive to the stability of national fiscal revenue, but also conducive to the preservation and appreciation of property holders. Therefore, it is the inevitable trend of tax development. However, judging from the actual situation in China, only by solving many problems currently faced can we pave the way for the smooth levy of property tax.

How to Evaluate Collection Objects and Their Relevance

Levying property tax also faces the problem that it is difficult to effectively evaluate the property value. In addition to the diversity of property, the lack of appraisers and the lack of evaluation system are all restrictive factors. It is reported that there are only about 30,000 appraisers in China, and the number of registered appraisers is less than 1 10,000. Some counties don't even have a registered appraiser. These people obviously can't evaluate hundreds of trillion square meters of urban real estate in 660 cities across the country. Without a correct assessment, the property tax cannot be reasonably collected. In addition, can we ensure that professionals will not seek rent when evaluating real estate, and so on. These are all practical problems before us.

Judicial position and legislative procedure of property tax

The levy of property tax also faces the problems of legal status, legislative procedures and adjustment of other related legal relations, because according to the current legislative procedures, to add a new tax similar to property tax, it is necessary to go through the relevant procedures of the National People's Congress to establish the corresponding legal status. Before it can be implemented. The establishment of such a complex tax involves all aspects of interest adjustment, from multi-sectoral decision-making, to the deliberation of the Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council, to the resolution of the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC), and then to the National People's Congress. It will take at least three years.

In addition, the introduction of property tax will inevitably involve the merger of many taxes and fees, and a series of laws and regulations will be amended or even abolished. For example, if the land transfer fee is not collected, how will the land auction be carried out in the future? The revision of a large number of laws and regulations, such as the Land Management Law and the Urban Real Estate Management Law, cannot be achieved in a short time.