I Collaborate with the Government Within My Capabilities: Vache Gabrielyan

From the perspective of the investment environment, I do not think that two percent tax privileges will bring significant changes. This was stated today, July 2, by former Deputy Prime Minister Vache Gabrielyan during a conversation with journalists.

“This does not mean that they will have a harmful impact, it certainly will not hinder anyone from investing, but the privileges provided by the tax code regarding both profit tax and income tax will not generate significant investments; that is a different issue and is mainly related to other problems. The most important aspect is the size of the market, apart from that, there are legal regulations, courts, and other issues,” he noted.

In response to the question of whether the current government is performing better than the previous one based on numerical indicators, Vache Gabrielyan answered, “I do not think I should make such assessments now; any figure from this government can be compared to a figure from the previous government. For example, the government's 7 percent to the previous government's 9 percent, but it may very well be that the salary here is higher than there. Therefore, I do not enter into such comparisons. I say let’s look at economic distribution; what kind of income opportunities does that economic distribution provide, what is the level of the average salary, those are the discussions I want to become the subject of dialogue. I ask what kind of incomes we want to see in the near future, what should be the ratio of taxes to GDP, if we have 21-22 percent, in my opinion, that is not sufficient, but to say it should be 30 percent tomorrow is illogical.”

In response to a question about the minimum wage by the current government, he mentioned that there are already questions arising regarding this matter: “I can look at it from a medium-term spending perspective, because the estimate presented in the accompanying document amounts to tens of billions, and based on my calculations, it’s around 55-60 billion. I cannot yet say where that amount will come from to increase it. Some deputies, the authors of the proposal, say that the actual expense will be 6 billion, but in the existing legislative package, I do not see 6 billion; I see ten times more. However, they still mention that work is ongoing and there will be a discussion in the parliament. Once I see the final calculations, I can provide an opinion. In my opinion, the tempo is accelerating too much, but again, I will make calculations to present.”

When asked whether he collaborates with this government, he replied, “I collaborate with the government within my capabilities.”