Dec. 2017
Survey of Corporate Attitude Toward Corporate Tax Reform
30% of companies plan to implement pay raises, and 20% plan to implement capital investment.
— The higher the awareness of reform, the higher is the motivation for pay raises and capital investment. —
Introduction
Various countries have announced policies to support the improvement of corporate competitiveness through their tax systems, such as by lowering the corporate tax rate. For tax reform to promote work style reform and improve productivity, the government is considering a corporate tax system that may alleviate the burden on companies that have increased pay and investment in advanced technology, while considering a policy to review tax incentives for companies that have not been active in these respects. Under these circumstances, the ruling coalition officially announced their outline of the 2018 tax reform proposals on December 14, 2017.
Teikoku Databank has conducted a survey of corporate attitudes toward corporate tax reform. This survey was conducted in conjunction with the December 2017 TDB Trends Research.
*Survey period: December 18, 2017 - January 9, 2018; Companies Surveyed: 23,113; Valid Responses: 10,168 (Response Rate: 44.0%)
*Details of this survey can be found on the dedicated Economic Trend Survey HP. (http://www.tdb-di.com).
Primary points of survey results(summary)
- 1With respect to the awareness of corporate tax reform, companies that "know about it, including the details" account for 4.9%. Combined with the 67.9% of companies that "know about the summary only," it is 72.8%, and over 70% of companies are at least aware of the outline of corporate tax reform.
- 2 In response to this corporate tax reform, 30.3% and 20.3% of companies responded "implement (including plan to implement)" pay raises and capital investment, respectively. Pay raises are expected in over 30% of companies with 6 to 100 employees, and capital investment is expected in over 20% of companies with 21-1000 employees.
Although there is a difference in the intention to implement pay raises through capital funding, there is no such big difference in capital investment as in pay raises. However, the intention to implement differs according to awareness. In particular, 52.5% of companies whose capital funding is up to 100 million yen and that "know about it, including the details" plan to implement pay raises. - 3 With respect to policies that companies would request of the government for corporate taxation system reform, the highest is "reduction in effective corporate tax rate" at 48.0%, followed by "reduction of corporate tax" (36.1%) in over 30%, "expansion of grants and subsidies" (28.2%), and "simplification of the tax system" (27.7%). On the other hand, "reduction in effective corporate tax rate," and "review of pro forma standard taxation" showed high percentages in large companies, and "reduction of corporate enterprise tax," "reduction of corporate inhabitant tax,” "reduction of corporate tax" and "review of fixed assets tax" showed high percentages in small to medium-sized companies.
- 4 With respect to contribution to the revitalization of the Japanese economy through this corporate tax reform, 28.6% of companies responded "contribute," and 26.2% responded "not contribute,” so opinions were almost polarized. However, up to almost half of companies, or 45.3%, responded "do not know,” and this suggests many companies cannot fully determine the effect on the entire Japanese economy.