Skip to main content
Fiscal year 2018

Accrued taxes and tax revenues

In 2018, taxes accrued grew by 5.7% (6.1% if only the four main figures are included; Table 1.4). In both cases, the growth is very similar to that registered in 2017 (5.9% for the total and 5.8% for the main figures). The increase in taxes accrued is similar to that recorded in tax revenues, once the impact of the implementation of the SII (5.4%) was eliminated in 2017 and 2018. This indicates that the differences caused by the different timing of income registration (the accrual period in the first case and the payment or refund period in the second) hardly had any influence, in aggregate terms, in 2018, as can be seen in Graph 1.16 that illustrates the process of generating tax revenue from the tax base.

The personal income tax accrued grew by 5.3% in 2018, below the 6.2% of the previous year (Table 2.1). Given the stability of the effective rate, the growth was exclusively due to the favorable evolution of incomes. The lower increase in accrued tax compared to 2017 is a consequence of the negative impact, indicated in the previous section, caused by the extension of family deductions. This fact also explains the difference in 2018 between the variation in the total tax (5.3%) and without differential tax or family deductions (6.3%).

The main component of the tax, withholdings on labor income, grew by 6.5% in 2018 (in 2017, 4.5%). It is the same rate that was recorded in salaries (Table 2.3) and that, as a novelty in 2018, came not only from the increase in employment, but also from the increase in the average salary and the increase in the effective rate that came with it. For its part, pension withholdings grew by 6.7% (5.3% in 2017). The growth of the type that in the most recent years explained more than half of the growth in withholdings, in 2018 was limited by the expansion of the reduction for work income that favored the lowest pensions, but, in exchange, the increase approved in the Budgets led to a significant increase in the bases.

In 2018, personal income tax revenue rose to 82,859 million euros, 7.6% more than in 2017. The discrepancy that occurs between the growth of the tax accrued and that of income is justified by the annual declaration that includes each measure. The 2018 declaration to be settled in 2019 is added to the accrued tax and, as has been seen, is expected to have worse results than in 2017 due to the increase in family deductions, while the income contains the results of the 2017 declaration. presented in 2018 and which contributed almost 1,000 million euros to the growth of collection. 

The Corporate Tax accrued is expected to grow by 15.1% in 2018 (11.1% without the differential fee that will be presented in July; Table 3.1). The main component of the tax is installment payments, which grew by 11.9% in 2018. The behavior of these payments was very different in the different groups of taxpayers (Table 3.2). In Large Companies and consolidated groups, which are taxed according to their profits, the increase in payments reached 13.5% (18.3% in groups and 5.4% in companies not belonging to groups), very much above what was achieved in 2017. The improvement occurred in a very concentrated way in the groups and, in particular, in a small number of them; In the rest of the companies, the growth in 2018 was lower than that of 2017. It is also worth highlighting the increase in the contribution of the minimum payment in these results. For their part, payments in SMEs (which are taxed according to the last annual installment presented) grew by 2.3%, which represented a strong contraction compared to the growth of the previous three years.

Tax revenues grew to 24,838 million, 7.3% more than what was collected in 2017. The difference with respect to the tax accrued is a consequence of the advancement of the rate of refunds. If this element is corrected, income growth would be 12.8%, a figure closer to accrual.

In cash terms, the two determining elements in 2018 were the evolution of installment payments mentioned above and the 14.1% increase in refunds (Table 7.2). It must be remembered that these returns are not derived from the activity in the year, but are linked to declarations and settlements from previous years.

The VAT accrued grew by 5.6% in 2018, the same increase as the subject expense (Table 4.1). In 2018 there were changes in some rates, but their impact on the tax as a whole is marginal.

Tax revenues from VAT amounted to 70,177 million, 10.3% more than in 2017 (Table 4.2). The figures are affected by the impact of the SII. If corrected, growth would be 3.7%. The difference between accrual and cash occurred mainly for two reasons: the high volume of refunds made corresponding to the previous year and the adjustments with the provincial territories, and the decrease in income from previous periods (a consequence of the changes in the management of deferrals that took place in 2017 and whose effects were carried over into 2018) .

The Special Taxes accrued grew by 1.9% in 2018, compared to 0.2% in 2017 (Table 5.1). As noted when talking about the bases, the rebound is not explained so much by the positive evolution of consumption, but rather by the irregular behavior that consumption had in 2017, particularly in tobacco and alcohol. In the tax accrued in Hydrocarbons, the figure with the greatest weight in all of these taxes, the growth in 2018 was 1.8%, below the 2.6% achieved in 2017 (Table 5.4). The cause of the lower growth was the decrease in the consumption of natural gas (a decrease associated mostly with the lower use of it in the generation of electrical energy), and, in the last part of the year, the elimination of the tax for this product and for diesel and fuel oil for the same purpose introduced by RDL 15/2018. In the most consumed products, gasoline and diesel, growth in 2018 was similar to that of the previous year (2.4% and 2.1%, respectively), although the result was obtained, above all, by the increase of nearly 5% in heating oil, more volatile and less linked to the general activity of the economy. The Tax on Tobacco Products grew by 2.4% (-4.8% in 2017; Table 5.5). The irregularity of the series disturbs the diagnosis that can be made of this figure in which consumption and the tax accrued have been practically stabilized since 2013 with 2.1 billion packs and 6.6 billion euros per year. The Electricity Tax accrued increased by 4.4% in 2018, almost 3.5 points more than in 2017 (Table 5.6). Most of the growth was due to irregularities that occurred in May 2017 in the billing of some companies, which makes it appear that consumption grew more in 2018 than it actually did. The Coal Tax registered a sharp decrease of 15.1% (Table 5.7) when compared to the high level of income that had been achieved in the tax in 2017, coinciding with the problems of drought and the use of coal as a substitute for coal. hydrographic sources. Even so, and with a broader perspective, 2018 income was only slightly lower than the average of 275 million annually for the 2014-2017 period. Finally, in taxes on alcohol, revenues grew by 1.8% overall (0.5% in 2017) due to the recovery in Alcohol and Derived Beverages and despite the slowdown in beer consumption (Tables 5.2 and 5.3). .

In 2018, tax revenue from Special Taxes totaled 20,528 million, which was 1.1% more than in 2017. The small differences with accrual, concentrated especially in tobacco and alcohol, are still a consequence of the transfers to 2017 of the income accrued in the last months of 2016, after the rate increase at that time.

The rest of the tax figures other than the four main ones represented income of 10,284 million, 4.8% more than in 2017. Virtually all of the increase is due to Non-Resident Income Tax . In 2018, its income registered a growth of 17.2%, which is explained by the evolution of income subject to withholdings (especially due to the improvement in dividends) and by the result of the annual declaration (Table 6.1). On the positive side, the environmental taxes of Chapter I (3.6%) and the Other income of Chapter III (6.4%) also stood out. ). On the negative side, it is worth noting the drop in income from fees (-11%; Table 6.5) as a consequence, fundamentally, of the decrease in income from the Canon for the use of continental waters for the production of electrical energy (-43.9%), affected by the drought of 2017 (year that was settled in 2018) and despite the rate increase that came into effect in 2018.