10/04/2013
In France, families slaughter IR up to half of domestic spending Autor: BBC Brasil
Even individuals exempt from income tax (IR) may benefit from hiring a domestic worker. They receive a tax credit via a check sent by the Treasury, also corresponding to half of the amounts paid.
It ensures that the so-called "Universal Service Employment Cheque" (CESU) system created by the government to stimulate the reduction of informal domestic work and also allow the creation of jobs in the country.
In practice, the French government which funds part of the hiring of maids, nannies, gardeners, helpers who provide services to older people and even professionals who support the home school, among many other activities.
The ceiling of the annual spending on salaries and expenses awarded IR rebate or tax credit is 12 billion euros ($ 31,200) a year - the employer may have a refund of half that sum.
But the total wages and payroll taxes paid can reach up to 20 thousand euros per year (tax reduction of 10 thousand euros per year) if the employer having children or the elderly over 65 years in the house or people with disabilities.
Practicality
The French system has another advantage: its practicality. After signing up on the website of CESU, the employer may declare monthly internet the number of hours performed by domestic workers.
The CESU also sends the mail to the employee payslips to prove that he was actually declared on Social Security.
The mining journalist Adriana Brandao uses the system for years. Four domestic workers currently provide services for her and her family.
In his Paris apartment, a cleaner working Filipino (four hours per week to 13 euros per hour, almost $ 34), Brazilian nanny and Angelina Jacob, also four hours per week, 11 euros per hour (U.S. $ 28.60) .
In France, as in other European countries, payment of domestic workers is usually calculated per hour.
Brandão, married to a Swiss writer and mother of a boy, also regularly employs a gardener at his summer home in southern France and, occasionally, a cleaner.
"In addition to ensuring the rights of these workers, always wanted to declare people who work at home to take cover in case of accident," said Brandao BBC Brazil.
"This comes at a cost because the payment of social security contributions almost doubles the salary. But the tax reduction is also of course an incentive for state workers, "she says.
Last year, she spent about 5600 euros (£ 14,600) in wages and labor charges and could kill half that amount from your IR.
Benefits
In France, have an employee who works at home the whole month is something reserved for the upper class.
"It's very different from Brazil. In France, even with cleaner, we have to put our hands dirty and doing laundry, dusting and tidying the house every day, "said Brandao.
"Maybe with the new PEC of household, many Brazilian start to clean house as do European," she says.
According to French government figures, 4 million French households (17% of total) used the services of domestic workers in 2011 (last available data).
There are 2 million domestic workers declared in France. The activity moved 17.4 billion euros in the country (1% of GDP) in 2011, according to the government.
"The tax benefits to employers helped to reduce the informal labor sector," said Laurent Hénart, president of the National Agency for Services Provided to person, which centralizes the system of CESU.
According to him, 320 000 domestic jobs were created in France since the system of checks went into effect in 2006.
The simplified system for declaring French domestic workers is praised by the International Labour Organisation (ILO).
"The tax reduction for employers comes at a cost to the state, but in the end he wins with the increasing number of formal workers," he told BBC Brazil jurist Martin Oelz, ILO expert on working conditions.
Daniela Fernandes
Paris for the BBC Brazil
