The producers of fossil fuels are currently recording enormously high sales.
(Photo: dpa)
So far there has been little resistance to the radical proposal that the EU Commission has drawn up. Companies that produce oil, gas and coal should pay off part of their “windfall profits” – in addition to the taxes they pay anyway.
There is no political justification for this. A company is also entitled to random profits. Just as companies can go broke by accident, so can they make big profits by accident. In principle, there is nothing disreputable about it.
In addition, in normal times, tax increases should be announced with sufficient advance notice. But now it’s about the gains for 2022, some of which have already been made.
But states have little choice. Without intervention and rescue operations, the economy would collapse in this critical situation. Even those politicians who are committed to allowing market forces to play as freely as possible are currently having to organize government protective shields for companies and citizens.
Top jobs of the day
Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.
You need money for this. Taking this money away from crisis profiteers will weaken investment. This is always the case when the state grabs the company’s pockets. Since the size of the profits was completely unpredictable, the effect is not particularly strong in this case. No company will therefore have to expect that a solidly generated profit will be arbitrarily withdrawn.
The economic damage would be greater if the states had to let actually healthy medium-sized companies go bankrupt due to lack of money or if they were completely overindebted at the end of this crisis and could no longer invest. Europeans must act quickly in this crisis. This can lead to regulatory principles being violated – hopefully only temporarily.
More: Draft law is available: This is how the EU wants to skim off the profits of oil and gas companies