Greece's deficit still growing
Baku, October 12 (AZERTAC). Greece's budget deficit continued to widen in September due to an austerity-driven recession, despite a fresh batch of tax measures that were supposed to start lifting receipts.
The central government deficit grew 15 percent year-on-year to 19.16 billion Euros in the first nine months of the year, finance ministry data showed.
Debt-laden Greece is scrambling to meet fiscal targets set by its international lenders under a bailout plan so that it can continue to receive EU/IMF funding and avoid default.
In September, Athens increased sales tax on restaurants to 23 percent and started collecting a one-off tax ranging from 1-5 percent on gross income.
But the moves failed to visibly boost net tax receipts, which shrank by 4.2 percent year-on-year in Jan-Sept, compared with a 5.3 percent drop in the first eight months of the year.
Greece said on Wednesday it would catch up with a target to increase net tax receipts by 0.8 percent for the full year, helped by a new property tax and other spending cuts that will kick in the rest of the year.
“The current revenue shortfall is expected to be dealt with in the last quarter,” the finance ministry said.
Greece's international lenders said on Tuesday that Greece would miss its budget deficit target this year, but that it could catch up in 2012 if it acts decisively enough.
Primary spending before interest payments rose by 2.9 percent year-on-year, mainly because the government increased payments to social security organizations, whose revenues are drying up because of the recession.
Other news in this section
