News Stop: Singapore GST to rise to 7%. Who will survive?
November 13, 2006 by WeiChang
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong announced in parliament today that the government will increase the GST to 7%. This will definitely have a huge impact on SMEs and companies that absorb the GST. For those businesses that are not registered for GST taxes, it may be a good idea to consider voluntarily registering for GST now. Let’s discuss sensible moves that SMEs should take to minimize profit loss.
Related Video: GST to raise to 7%
“This is inevitable over the next 5 to 10 years. Infrastructure investments will cost money – R&D is to cost $5b over the next 5 years; as medical technology improves, people age and more will go to hospitals to get more treatment, so spending is bound to go up. As we tilt the playing field across the board, the lower income will be getting another boost, not just once in a while. Therefore its better to start building resources now so that when we spend more, we have the means to do so,” said Mr Lee.
To finance this, indirect taxes or the Goods & Services Tax will have to go up.
About The Author
WeiChang - Co-Founder
A seasoned entrepreneur despite his youth. Armed with the experience of tossing snowballs in Europe during his Polytechnic exchange programme at ESIEE (Paris), Lai founded his first company (PINKCUBE) at the turn of the millennium in his mind when he was in his late teens. However, he only formalized it 2 months after he was diagnosed with cancer in 2004. The illness was so serious then that no one even dared to ask for a prognosis. Knowing that he had nothing to lose, Lai tried and failed many times in his entrepreneurship endeavors during his chemotherapy and radiotherapy sessions. But he never gave up, and with the help of his partners during his NUS undergrad days, he founded the largest tuition agency in Singapore - ManyTutors.com. His interest for business does not stop here though, and Lai is currently managing numerous businesses including the Otaku House retail outlets and Internet projects to build the next Google.
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