Official Portal - Statistics Portugal
      
 

Fiscal Revenues Statistics
The fiscal burden reached about 1/3 of GDP in 2011
Tax revenue statistics
Fiscal Revenues Statistics The fiscal burden reached about 1/3 of GDP in 2011 - 2011
19 October 2012

Summary
In 2011 the fiscal burden in Portugal reached 33.2% of GDP. This is the highest figure since 1995 and exceeds the value observed in 2010 by 1.7 percentage points.
This evolution is mainly associated with the rise of the revenue coming from direct taxes (11.1%), which reflects increases of 9.2% and 13.5% in the revenues corresponding to the individual income tax and to the corporate income tax, respectively.
Indirect taxes exhibited a more moderate growth rate (1.1%), which is due to effects of distinct directions occurring on the revenue side: on the one hand, there was an increase in the revenues from the value added tax (VAT), the excise duties on tobacco and the real estate tax, amounting to 5.3%, 8.3% and 8.9%, respectively. On the other hand, the revenues from the tax on oil and energetic products, the “stamp duty”, the tax on motor vehicle sales and the real estate transfer tax fell by 7.3%, 13.4%, 22.6% and 23.2%, respectively.
Actual social contributions increased by 2.5%, mainly reflecting the evolution of social contributions paid by the self-employed, the integration of workers from the banking sector in the Social Security general scheme and the actions taken in the context of debt recovery processes.
According to the available information, in 2010 the fiscal burden in Portugal (31.5%) was significantly lower than the average for the European Union (38.5%).
Finally, it is released the estimate for the VAT gap obtained in the context of national accounts. In the period ranging from 2006 to 2010, the average VAT gap corresponded to 1,752 million euro, amounting to 11.4% of the VAT revenue. The maximum value for the considered time frame was verified in 2009 (18.7%), whereas the minimum was attained in 2007 (7.9%).

Press release
Download the document PDF (172 Kb)
Tables
Excel Excel (307 Kb)
CSV CSV (40 Kb)