Total tax revenue last year went up by €260.6 million over the previous year, and stood at €2,747.6 million, implying a tax burden of 34.6 per cent, the National Statistics Office said today.

Tax revenue may be broadly classified under three main headings: indirect taxes, direct taxes and social contributions.

All three categories of tax revenue registered an increase. The largest rise was recorded in indirect taxes by €118.5 million. These represent taxes linked to production and imports.

The NSO said that this increase was triggered by higher returns from VAT (€60.1 million) and taxes on products (€50.4 million). Moreover, other taxes on production and import duties went up by €6.2 million and €1.8 million respectively. During 2014, indirect taxes stood at €1,111.9 million, making up 40.5 per cent of total tax revenue.

Concurrently, direct taxes increased by €111.2 million. These are defined as current taxes on income and wealth plus capital taxes and other current taxes. In the year under review, such taxes amounted to €1,167.3 million, representing 42.5 per cent of total tax revenues.

The rise in direct taxes was mainly the result of added proceeds from other current taxes (€38.2 million), personal income tax (€37.5 million) and corporate income tax (€36.2 million). Conversely, capital taxes registered a marginal decline of €0.9 million.

Social contributions are compulsory actual contributions paid by the employees, employers, as well as self- and non-employed persons. This category represented 17.0 per cent of total tax revenue, at €468.4 million, an increase of €30.9 million over 2013.

The overall tax burden denotes the total amount of taxes and actual social contributions, expressed as a percentage of GDP. During 2014, the tax burden for Malta was 34.6 per cent compared to 33.0 per cent recorded in 2013.

Analysing the income tax receipts by ESA 2010 institutional sector, in 2014, the household sector accounted for the biggest share with 52.3 per cent. In addition, the financial and non-financial corporations sectors contributed 26.6 per cent and 20.8 per cent respectively.

On aggregate, the non-profit institutions serving households, general government and rest of the world totalled 0.3 per cent.

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