Lawyer Truong Thanh Duc: Properties should only be taxed if its accumulated values exceed $220,000

According to Le Thi Mai Lien, head of the strategic financial policy of the Institute of Strategy and Policy and Finance of MOF, 174 out of 193 countries in the world have applied property tax.

Property tax is regarded as a source of the government's proactive revenue, which helps increase social equality, encourage people to manage their assets more effectively and also increase the autonomy of localities.

Lien suggested that the property tax should be imposed as progressive tax to ensure social equality. Furthermore, the government should set a tax frame, then the local goverment can base on that frame to set a most suitable tax rate with their development's level. 

Sharing the same viewpoint, Lawyer Truong Thanh Duc, Chairman of BASICO Law Firm Member Council, said that the property tax in Vietnam should be a progressive tax with an extremely low starting rate.

Particularly, Duc suggested that the authorities should put the tax rate of 0.1 per cent into the property law at first then gradually increase the tax rate to 0.3 per cent or 0.4 per cent after 10 years.

Opposing to the proposal of MOF to collect land tax and housing tax with a value over VND700 million ($30,500) at the rate of 0.4 per cent each, Duc also mentioned that the property of an individual should be accumulated and only be taxed if its value exceeds VND5 billion ($220,000) to avoid taxing low-income people. 

The property tax must first be based on the ability to pay taxes of taxpayers i.e people with less property should not be taxed as well as people with lower income should not be taxed same as people with higher income to ensure fairness and social equality.