Economist Dr. Patrick Assuming has said that the 2024 budget must focus on tax compliance measures and not introduce new taxes.
The Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, is scheduled to present the government’s 2024 Annual Budget Statement and Economic Policy to Parliament on Wednesday, November 15, 2023.
Ahead of the presentation, there have been calls for the government to significantly reduce its expenditure to rescue the ailing economy.
Speaking in an interview on the Point of View on Citi TV on Monday, Dr. Assuming indicated that the government needed to look for ways to use the current tax measures to raise revenue rather than introduce new ones in the 2024 budget.
“You will expect that there might be some revenue measures, whether you will go the traditional way, which more or less is the easy way of bringing new tax lines or not.”
“Personally, I hope that we will move away from that and focus a lot more on compliance, a lot more on other low-hanging fruits that are there that we can use to raise revenue rather than bringing new tax handles,” he stated.
Meanwhile, the Economist said that the removal of taxes in the upcoming budget looked unlikely.
“Overall, the outlook for removing some of the tax measures looks quite unlikely,” he opined.