Economic Opening of the Year: Changes to PIT, State Sanatorium Fees, and Subsidies

The upcoming spring brings significant changes to Polish household budgets, starting with the costs of spa treatment. Despite earlier rumors circulating in the media, the NFZ is not introducing a new, extraordinary fee revaluation this year, but is only routinely switching to the seasonal summer price list. Therefore, patients who complete their referrals by April 30th will pay slightly less for accommodation and meals. As medical law experts strongly emphasize, these costs are borne entirely by the patients, and information about alleged refunds of 1500 złoty for people in difficult financial situations has proven completely unfounded. Struggling with rising costs of daily living, citizens are also increasingly seeking medical alternatives abroad, massively opting for advanced dental treatment in countries offering significantly lower service prices. The spa treatment system in Poland is based on restrictive regulations enacted nearly two decades ago, which imposed an absolute obligation on patients to co-finance hotel costs, while the rehabilitation treatments themselves remain fully free and paid for from contributions. In the area of annual settlements with the tax authorities, an extremely intensive season of filing tax declarations is currently underway. The National Tax Administration has significantly accelerated the procedures for transferring overpayments, directing funds with incredible speed to taxpayers using fully electronic channels. At the same time, the Ministry of Finance is strongly tightening cross-checks, verifying the family tax relief particularly rigorously. Officials are currently checking the eight most common cases and errors leading to unjustified deductions. On the other hand, investors trading cryptocurrencies can count on minimized bureaucracy, as under strictly defined statutory conditions they are exempt from the burdensome levy. Meanwhile, advanced debates are taking place in parliamentary committees over proposals for a fundamental reform of employee burdens. There are calls for a bold increase of the second tax threshold to an impressive 150 thousand złoty and a doubling of the tax-free amount to 60 thousand złoty, which could drastically reverse market trends and make stable employment more attractive relative to the popular "B2B contract." Legal and official limits for tax-free donations are also increasing. Considered Changes to PIT Tax: Tax-free amount: 30,000 zł → 60,000 zł; Tax threshold (second bracket): 120,000 zł → 150,000 zł or 171,000 zł The government is de facto not abandoning the pursuit of a broad protective support policy, successively launching new aid instruments. Since mid-February, people with disabilities using respirators or oxygen concentrators can submit applications to PFRON for co-financing of energy bills, which amounts to 100 zł per month, totaling up to 600 złoty in support. With people with disabilities in mind, dedicated subsidies from the appropriate offices' pools have also been activated. Radical interventions, however, await the key electromobility sector – at the beginning of March, the long-awaited call for subsidies related to the purchase of new-generation vehicles starts. The press reports on an alleged possibility of obtaining financing covering a gigantic part of the transaction value, although common analysts expect hard and published regulations. The future of Polish national media is shaping up quite differently, as the abolition of the inefficient RTV license fee, to be replaced by a universal, extremely difficult to avoid fee for all solvent souls, has been almost finally planned. Meanwhile, politicians from The Left are still fighting for their own ministerial program concerning citizen healthcare. „Un nouvel impot sur la sante est une etape indispensable pour assainir durablement le financement hospitalier.” (A new health tax is an indispensable step to sustainably clean up hospital financing.) — Left activists Economic transformations and budgetary tensions arrived directly after the publication of a special act irreversibly extinguishing the lion's share of previous benefits for war refugees from Ukraine.

Perspektywy mediów: Titles with a liberal slant focus on and emphasize the spectacular benefits resulting from raising the tax-free amount and relieving the lowest earners. Free-market profile services raise alarm about hidden RTV fees and point to fiscal tightening of the screws on families.