The government is exploring the possibility of widening the non-tax threshold of so-called fringe benefits for all employees with a temporary bonus for those with dependent children.
What are we talking about? Let’s try to understand together. The term fringe benefit refers to all the goods or services a company offers to its employees. In practice, they are a true form of “payment in kind” added to the traditional paycheck and can be a basic help to the worker in everyday life, especially in a time of high inflation like the current one. Company car, health care, the condition of any insurance policy or the possibility of the employee to benefit from company accommodation can be considered as fringe benefits.
Benefits help generate employee income and are taxed, but only if the final amount exceeds certain thresholds. Finally, it should be emphasized that these benefits are not the right of the worker: the company decides whether (and to what extent) these benefits are given to its employees. And therefore, they cannot be considered an additional thirteenth. Because not everyone has the right to do so.
Side advantage: newcomers
So what will change for employees? The aim of the majority is to encourage employers to provide these benefits by raising the tax threshold. The tax-free limit is set at 258 euros today. The Draghi government had raised the threshold to 600 euros for 2022 alone, starting from the usual limit. In addition to the increase in the amount, the list of items that can benefit from the subsidy has been expanded, so that the amounts paid for domestic bill payments pushed up by high energy costs are also included in the fringe benefits. The threshold, which was later raised to 3,000 euros until 31 December 2022 by the Aiuti quadruple decree, is about to go down again in 2023. The Meloni government has reinstated the tax-free limit of 3,000, but only for employees with children.
But now the executive is exploring the possibility of revising the law. The idea reported by Ansa is to bring the threshold to 1,000 euros for all employees, but a child bonus of 660 euros for up to 3 children. This means that the limit will increase to EUR 1,660 for an employee with dependent children, and EUR 2,980 for an employee with 3 children. It is currently a hypothesis. Also because the measure cost about 250 million, raising the threshold only for employees with children would cost a hundred million less. These are not astronomical numbers, but the majority will need to find the necessary coverage.
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Source: Today IT
Roy Brown is a renowned economist and author at The Nation View. He has a deep understanding of the global economy and its intricacies. He writes about a wide range of economic topics, including monetary policy, fiscal policy, international trade, and labor markets.
