Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 27 May 2021

Committee on Budgetary Oversight

Fiscal Assessment Report: Irish Fiscal Advisory Council

Dr. Eddie Casey:

Cumulatively, by 2025, we assume the impact will be €1.5 billion in terms of potential lost income tax receipts. The year-to-year figure varies. Generally, the estimate that we use, which comes from Revenue, is that for every 1% wage increase for which non-indexation is provided, the impact amounts to approximately €150 million.

There are big questions about how far they go with indexation as well. Is it just income tax or is it universal social charge, USC, or other things? We do not know so we took a conservative estimate. The potential impact could, therefore, be higher. It goes back to the view that wages will grow to some degree in the later years and, given that growth, we expect that the impact could be quite high.