Swiss House of Representatives rejects plan to abolish marriage tax penalty

National Council recommends rejection of marriage penalty initiative Keystone-SDA

The Swiss House of Representative recommended rejecting the centrist initiative to abolish the marriage penalty in federal tax without a counter-proposal by 99 votes to 92. It considers the proposed model to be unsuitable and favours individual taxation.

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The initiative “Yes to fair federal taxes for married couples too – finally abolish discrimination against marriage” has been passed to the Senate. In the debate that continued on Wednesday, the House did not want to enshrine preferential tax treatment for married couples in the constitution.

Taxation independent of marital status could not be achieved in this way, which was actually the aim. However, the individual taxation adopted in June achieves this and preserves the room for manoeuvre by not being enshrined in the constitution.

In addition, the federal government would lose between CHF700 million ($888 million) and CHF1.4 billion depending on how the initiative is implemented. In the case of individual taxation, the loss of revenue amounts to CHF600 million. Finance Minister Karin Keller-Sutter also opposed the initiative.

Adapted from German by DeepL/jdp

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