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🇮🇸 Iceland /Economy & Trade

Useful innocents

From Morgunblaðið · () Icelandic

Translated from Icelandic and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

Opinion Sources not specified New plan
  • Jens Garðar Helgason criticizes the government of Prime Minister Kristrún Frostadóttir for raising charges and signaling further increases in the budget.
  • He says vehicle duties, a fossil-fuel mileage charge and higher tariffs have particularly affected households and businesses outside the capital region.
  • He also objects to plans to raise value-added tax on bathing lagoons and introduce a new fee for access to Iceland’s natural attractions.

It is becoming harder by the day to watch Kristrún Frostadóttir’s government raise charges on people and businesses while announcing further increases in its new budget, Jens Garðar Helgason writes.

He argues that many of the measures can fairly be called “rural taxes,” because they tend to weigh more heavily on people and companies outside the capital region. The government has already raised vehicle excise duties, introduced a mileage charge for fossil-fuel-powered vehicles and increased tariffs by up to tens of percent.

Helgason says these changes hit households and businesses particularly hard and add fuel to inflation. He argues that the government is not stopping there, pointing to plans to raise value-added tax on bathing lagoons and introduce a new fee for tourists visiting Iceland’s natural attractions.

Most bathing lagoons are located outside the capital region, he notes, as are the tourist destinations that would face the increased charges.

About this summary

Originally published by Morgunblaðið in Icelandic. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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