VAT cut from 9 to 5 pct for books starting next year

Newsroom 24/04/2015 | 13:47

Books are getting cheaper starting with January 1st 2016, Culture minister Ionut Vulpescu announced on Thursday, according to Agerpres.

Thus, the Value Added Tax (VAT) for books will be cut from 9 percent to 5 percent.

“The Culture minister announced today that, following some discussions with Prime Minister Victor Ponta and with Finance minister Eugen Teodorovici, he ob-tained the VAT cut for books to 5 percent. Ionut Vulpescu is going to file with the Chamber of Deputies an amendment to the new Tax Code draft, providing the VAT cut for books from 9 percent to 5 percent, Romania thus becoming one of the coun-tries with the lowest VAT in Europe,” shows a release issued on the World Book Day.

The measure on cutting the VAT from 9 percent to 5 percent is supposed to come into force starting January 1, 2016, at the same time with the new Tax Code, which provides, among others, the general VAT cut to 20 percent, but also other fiscal relaxation measures, the cited source points out.

“The VAT cut for books from 9 percent to 5 percent does not represent a consistent loss for the budget and, at the same time, helps publishing houses to keep an af-fordable selling price,” the minister says in the release.