This is bad news for the government as VAT is the main revenue for the State, which is trying by all means to find sources of income and reduce the public deficit.
VAT fraud is far from the 10 billion euros per year estimated by the government. In fact, it seems to be 17 billion euros, mainly due to a revision of the calculation that increased the total.
Whether validated or not, this figure seems to align with the estimate from the European Commission, which is much more pessimistic than the government regarding VAT fraud in France. Brussels had estimated the fraud at 25 billion euros for 2014 in France…
If the issue is thorny, it is obviously because VAT matters greatly for the State: it accounts for no less than 50% of the French State’s tax revenue, totaling 138.5 billion euros for 2014.
VAT fraud could even exceed the budgetary reduction planned for France in 2016, estimated at 16 billion euros… excluding the special measures announced following the Paris attacks.
