FOREIGN INCOME TAXATION BY INCOME TAX IN THE REPUBLIC OF SRPSKA Cover Image

ОПОРЕЗИВАЊЕ ПРИХОДА ИЗ СТРАНИХ ИЗВОРА ПОРЕЗОМ НА ДОХОДАК У РЕПУБЛИЦИ СРПСКОЈ
FOREIGN INCOME TAXATION BY INCOME TAX IN THE REPUBLIC OF SRPSKA

Author(s): Đorđe Marilović
Subject(s): Public Law
Published by: Правни факултет Универзитета у Нишу
Keywords: individual income tax; income from foreign sources; nonresident; analogy; regressive tax rate; fiscal policy

Summary/Abstract: The Income Tax Act of the Republic of Srpska, which regulates income taxation of natural persons, provides for a special institute (cedula) designated as “income from foreign sources”. The legislator’s intention was to offer natural persons, nonresidents of the Republic of Srpska, an opportunity to be taxed “stimulatively” for the income received from outside Bosnia and Herzegovina, provided that a nonresident has made qualified investment in the economy of the Republic of Srpska, which should ultimately lead to an increase of overall investments in the economy of the Republic of Srpska. Several questions have been raised in this article concerning the taxation of income from foreign sources. The author draws attention to lacuna iuris concerning tax base, temporal aspects of certain income tax law provisions (e.g. restrictions as to which provisions could be changed by subsequent laws), the regressive effect of taxing income from foreign sources, as well as to other systemic discrepancies between general income tax and taxation of income from foreign sources. The author supports the legislator’s intention to apply fiscal policy instruments in order to attract investments from nonresidents in a world of extremely movable capital but also warns about the need to define such instruments more accurately and systematically. Should the present Income Tax Act not be adjusted, the author predicts that application of the current fiscal policy instruments will be jeopardized; consequently, the current provisions on taxation of income from foreign sources may have significant distortive effects.

  • Issue Year: LVI/2017
  • Issue No: 76
  • Page Range: 747-765
  • Page Count: 19
  • Language: Serbian