The United Arab Emirates does not plan to tax the incomes of individuals or remittances abroad by foreign workers in the country, a senior government official was quoted as saying in local newspaper Gulf News on Wednesday.
With its state revenues hit by low oil prices, the UAE aims to impose value-added tax in 2018, and is studying reforms to increase taxation of corporations. It has also cut fuel subsidies.
But taxing individual incomes or remittances could have a greater effect in increasing companies’ wage costs and reducing the attractiveness of the UAE as a regional business hub, and Obaid Humaid al-Tayer, Minister of State for Financial Affairs, told the newspaper that those steps were not on the agenda.
“There is no intention and no plans to impose taxes on the income of individuals in the UAE,” he was quoted as saying.
