Summary
In 2012, the tax burden decreased by 5.9%, after the growth observed in 2010 and 2011, which accounted for approximately 32.3% of GDP (33.2% in the previous year). This reduction was associated with decreases in all tax burden's components - direct taxes (a change of -8.3%), indirect taxes (-3.9%) and social contributions (-6.2%).
Regarding direct taxes, there was a decrease of 6.7% in the individual income tax and of 17.4% in the corporate income tax collected by Central Government.
Altogether, indirect taxes were those who had a less significant reduction (a change rate of -3.9%), mainly as a result of the behaviour of the value added tax, with a variation of -1.7% and an increase of 8.3% in revenue from the real estate tax collected by Local Government. The tax on oil and energetic products, the excise duties on tobacco, the stamp duty, the tax on motor vehicle sales and the real estate transfer tax collected by Local Government showed significant decreases in 2012 (respectively -7.3 %, -5.6%, -8.0%, -42.5% and -17.7%).
The actual social contributions decreased 6.2% in 2012, a result that was influenced by the decrease of the employed population in 2012 (change rate of -4.2% for the total employment and -4.9% for employees).
According to available information, in 2011, Portugal continued to register a lower tax burden than the EU average (33.2% compared to 39.1% in the EU27).