{"id":20209,"date":"2020-11-13T15:15:50","date_gmt":"2020-11-13T20:15:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.benefitscanada.com\/news\/to-help-economy-bank-proposes-tax-on-working-from-home-152584"},"modified":"2020-11-13T15:15:50","modified_gmt":"2020-11-13T20:15:50","slug":"to-help-economy-bank-proposes-tax-on-working-from-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/2020\/11\/13\/to-help-economy-bank-proposes-tax-on-working-from-home\/","title":{"rendered":"To help economy, bank proposes tax on working from home"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Kelvin Chan, The Associated Press<\/span> | November 13, 2020 <\/p>\n

White-collar staff reaping the financial benefits of working from home should be taxed to help other workers who aren\u2019t getting the same advantages, experts at Deutsche Bank said in a new report.<\/p>\n

In its report on how to rebuild the economy after the coronavirus pandemic, the bank proposed a five-per-cent daily tax on each employee that continues to work from home, which could raise tens of billions of dollars for governments. The money could be used to help lower-income workers who have taken on greater risk because their jobs can\u2019t be done remotely, the report said.<\/p>\n

The bank noted the global pandemic has turbocharged the shift to remote work, a trend that looks set to last for the long term, with many workers expecting to spend at least a few days of their workweek at home even after the pandemic ends.<\/p>\n

Read: 85% of Canadian workers want option to keep working from home after coronavirus: survey<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

These workers benefit from more convenience and flexibility. They also save money directly because they don\u2019t have to pay for commuting costs, takeout lunches or buying and dry cleaning work clothes \u2014 but it means those businesses that have grown up to support office workers won\u2019t be able to recover and \u201cthe economic malaise will be extended,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n

While it doesn\u2019t make sense for the government to support, say, a downtown sandwich shop if it doesn\u2019t have any more customers from nearby office towers, \u201cit does make sense to support the mass of people who have been suddenly displaced by forces outside their control,\u201d the bank said. \u201cFrom a personal and economic point of view, it makes sense that these people should be given a helping hand.\u201d<\/p>\n

The tax would amount to just over $10 a day, assuming the average salary of an American working from home is $55,000. That\u2019s roughly the amount the worker might spend on commuting, lunch and laundry, which would leave them no worse off than going into the office, the report said. It could raise up to $48 billion in the U.S. Deutsche Bank carried out similar calculations for Germany and the U.K.<\/p>\n

Read: Employers expect remote, flexible arrangements to linger after coronavirus: survey<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

But the proposals faced heavy skepticism. Andrew Hunter, co-founder of job search engine Adzuna.co.uk, said the idea was misguided and predicted it would be incredibly unpopular.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt punishes progressive companies and those with kids or caring responsibilities, who were responsible during the pandemic, who are already taking on more costs and helping the environment by staying at home,\u201d he said. \u201cLet\u2019s be honest, there are many better ways to raise taxes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read the full article at BenefitsCanada.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kelvin Chan, The Associated Press | November 13, 2020 White-collar staff reaping the financial benefits of working from home should be taxed to help other workers who aren\u2019t getting the same advantages, experts at Deutsche Bank...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20209"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20209\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}