Linking tax and benefits to inflation positive but costly, ESRI finds

It would cost €460 million to peg taxes and welfare payments to prices and €1.2 billion to link them to wage growth

Freezing tax bands 'weakens incentives to work'. Pic: Getty

New research from the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) has found that increasing tax bands, tax credits and social welfare payments in line with price or wage inflation could cost up to €1.2 billion in Budget 2020.

The author of the report, Claire Keane, says that while linking the tax and benefits systems to inflation would be a positive move in terms oftackling inequality and poverty, it would cost €460 million to ...