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Maradona slammed with €39m tax bill in Italy

Italian tax agents have served football legend Diego Maradona with papers over a €39 million debt that the feisty Argentinian disputes, ANSA news agency reported on Friday.

Published: 18 October 2013 16:40 CEST
Maradona slammed with €39m tax bill in Italy
Diego Maradona won the World Cup with Argentina in 1986. Photo: Wagner Fontoura/Flickr

Maradona was in Milan for an event organised by best-selling sports daily Gazzetta dello Sport for the publication of a DVD collection on his life.

A source at the Equitalia tax recovery agency said the move was simply formal procedure since the papers only have a 180-day validity and therefore have to be renewed whenever Maradona is in Italy.

They would theoretically give legal premise for Italian authorities to seize Maradona's assets in Italy, which the international star does not have.

"This is not putting pressure," the source said.

Maradona's tax woes go back to when he played for Napoli between 1984 and 1991. In 2005, he was ordered to pay €37.2 million, €23.5 million of which were interest on the debt.

But Italian prosecutors resumed the trial from scratch in 2011 in what was seen as a victory by Maradona's lawyer in Italy, Angelo Pisani.

A final ruling on January 10th this year from a court in Naples has now made the sentence definitive.

"I am not a tax fraudster," Maradona protested last year. "I was playing football and someone else was signing for me," he said.

Maradona scored 115 goals in 259 games with Napoli, where he is still adored to this day. With him on the team, Napoli won their only two Italian league titles in 1987 and 1990.

He also won the World Cup with Argentina in 1986.

The former cocaine addict is now a roving sports ambassador for the United Arab Emirates following his departure from local club Al Wasl in 2012.

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TAXES

Beskæftigelsesfradraget: What is Denmark’s employment allowance?

Denmark's government may soon announce changes to its tax reform plans, which will give all wage earners a bigger employment allowance. What is this and how will it affect foreigners' earnings?

Published: 30 October 2023 15:21 CET
Beskæftigelsesfradraget: What is Denmark's employment allowance?

What is the employment allowance? 

The Beskæftigelsesfradraget (from beskæftigelse, meaning employment, and fradrag, meaning rebate) was brought in by the centre-right Liberal Party back in 2004, the idea being that it would incentivise people to get off welfare and into a job.

Everyone whose employer pays Denmark’s 8 percent AM-bidrag, or arbejdsmarkedsbidrag, automatically receives beskæftigelsesfradraget. Unlike with some of Denmark’s tax rebates, there is no need to apply. The Danish Tax Agency simply exempts the first portion of your earnings from income taxes. 

In 2022, beskæftigelsesfradraget was set at 10.65 percent of income with a maximum rebate of 44,800 kroner. 

How did the government agree to change the employment allowance in its coalition deal? 

In Responsibility for Denmark, the coalition agreement between the Social Democrats, the Liberals and the Moderate Party, the new government said it would set aside 5 billion kroner for tax reforms.

Of this, 4 billion kroner was earmarked for increasing the employment allowance, with a further 0.3 billion going towards increasing an additional employment allowance for single parents.

According to the public broadcaster DR, the expectation was that this would increase the standard employment  allowance to 12.75 percent up to a maximum rebate of 53,600 kroner. 

How might this be further increased, according to Børsen? 

According to a report in the Børsen newspaper, the government now plans to set aside a further 1.75 billion kroner for tax reforms, of which nearly half — about 800 million kroner — will go towards a further increase to the employment allowance. 

The Danish Chamber of Commerce earlier this month released an analysis in which it argued that by raising removing all limits on the rebate for single parents and raising the maximum rebate for everone else by 20,300 kroner, the government could increase the labour supply by 4,850 people, more than double the 1,500 envisaged in the government agreement. 

According to the Børsen, the government estimates that its new extended allowance will increase the labour supply by 5,150 people.  

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