THE House of Representatives on Monday approved on third and final reading the bill granting medical frontliners a 25-percent discount on their personal income tax.
Voting 235 affirmative, 0 negative and no abstention, lawmakers approved House Bill 8259 or the Handog sa mga Bayaning Lumaban Kontra Covid-19 Act.
The bill exempts medical frontliners from paying 25 percent of income tax due for taxable year 2020.
It also limits the coverage of the proposed tax exemption to salary or compensation, as well as the gross receipts from the exercise of profession or employment received by medical front liners for taxable year 2020.
The bill said the tax exemption shall not include those incomes received by the medical frontliners from their other businesses, investments, and other kinds of passive income not related to serving, treating, caring, aiding and assisting Covid-19 patients.
It also authorizes the Secretary of Finance to extend, for a period of not more than six months, the exemption from payment of income tax to qualified medical frontliners.
The revenue implication of the original proposal, a full tax exemption, was P9 billion, according to a position paper sent by the Department of Finance (DOF).
“The 25-percent discount will likely cover the taxes they would have owed on their Covid-19 allowances. That was the state’s attempt to compensate them for their service. Let me be clear: I do not want the government to tax their heroism,” House Committee on Ways and Means Chairman Joey Sarte Salceda said.