According to calculations by the Lipa taxpayers' association, this year's Tax Freedom Day in Croatia is today, June 28, a day earlier than in 2020.

Tax Freedom Day is the day in any given year, calculated from January 1, until which Croatians “work for the government,” meaning that everything they had earned up to that point is spent on various taxes over the course of the year. From that day on, they get to keep their earnings.

Lipa’s calculation was made for a hypothetical citizen who earns an average wage, is married with one child, lives in Zagreb, owns a car, does not smoke, and pays the mandatory TV license fee. Lipa said that in most European countries Tax Freedom Day fell much earlier than in Croatia.

“Reducing budget spending and implementing public sector reforms is the only way for taxpayers, who fill the state budget, to start marking Tax Freedom Day earlier than in previous years,” Lipa said.

It warned that Croatia was the second poorest EU country, with living standards barely above half the EU average.

“The only way to fix that, are reforms which would raise the Croatian economy’s competitiveness and accelerate economic growth in the long term,” Lipa president Davor Huic said.