Changes in excise duties in connection with harmonization processes in the Member States of the European Union

Although excise taxes only make up approximately 9% of the tax systems within EU Member States (EU) on average, their application can significantly affect the overall impact of taxes on taxpayers and the distribution of pensions in a company in a particular country. Different procedures for the inclusion or absence of such taxes in the sales prices of taxed products may be used in trade between countries – there may be tax competition between states or tax harmonisation. The internal market of the EU harmonises the taxation practices of selected products through excise duties and, including value added tax, this has resulted in a higher degree of legislation harmonisation being achieved in the EU than for other taxes. Nevertheless, the representation of excise taxes in tax systems and their impact on taxpayers can vary considerably between EU Member States. These differences have become the focus of the dissertation. The aim of the dissertation is to categorise, i.e. to define the groups of EU countries according to the importance of excise taxes in their tax systems, and to identify the factors influencing the inclusion of states in individual groups in connection with harmonising processes in EU countries. The dissertation is based on three statistical methods (cluster analysis, discriminatory analysis, sigma convergence) based on eleven studies and the statistical data processing of twenty-seven EU member states (excluding Croatia due to the absence of data) from Eurostat databases and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The cluster analysis results show that the original and new Member States that joined the EU in or after the year 2004 still differ in relation to the excise duties in the original states, and the differences between the two groups have slightly increased over time. For the discriminatory analysis, data relating to excise rates, absolute consumption of taxed products, excise tax revenue per capita, the living standard of citizens and the Gini coefficient were used. The discriminatory analysis provided information on the increasing impact of excise rates, in particular tax rates on diesel and cigarettes, with a simultaneous decline in the impact of consumption of taxed products between the years 2004 and 2015. The Gini coefficient is statistically significant in both these years. The reallocation of income among residents of a given country affects the income from excise duties and their share indices used at work. The Sigma Convergence of the Sub-Tax Quota for Excise Duty over the period 2000-2015 showed a continuing trend of divergence among EU members. Harmonisation of excise tax rules and application of minimum rates for selected products did not bring the Member States any real similarity.