Public accounts to make Bercy green with envy. The canton of Basel-Stadt in Switzerland, on the border with France and Germany, has posted a record surplus for the last ten years. So much so that its elected representatives want to refund part of the taxes paid by its 200,000 inhabitants, reports L’Est Républicain . A motion passed at the end of October by the canton’s Grand Council calls on the local government to prepare a law to this effect.

Between 2012 and 2022, the canton accumulated a surplus of 3.07 billion Swiss francs (3.29 billion euros). At the end of 2022, its debt-to-equity ratio was negative, at -6.7%. And despite a referendum on tax cuts in 2023, Basel-Stadt continues to amass a surplus it no longer knows what to do with. In September, the canton again forecast a surplus of 106 million Swiss francs (114 million euros) in 2024, higher than the 73 million (78 million euros) estimated when the budget was adopted.

2.5 billion Swiss francs to repay

The adopted motion therefore proposes to return 80% of the annual surplus in the public accounts to the taxpayer – in order to retain room for manoeuvre – only in years when the debt ratio is negative. This refund would only benefit individuals, not companies. It would be paid in the form of a tax credit, in proportion to the taxpayer’s tax rate in the year of the refunded surplus.

With an average annual surplus of 313.3 million Swiss francs (336 million euros) between 2012 and 2022, this would amount to returning 250 million Swiss francs (268 million euros) a year to taxpayers for this decade of accounts in the green, calculates the local government. It estimates that this would represent an average of 2,535 Swiss francs (2,719 euros) per taxpayer per year.