The proposal to move tax collection, tax control, and tax accounting from the local government units of LGUs (municipalities) to 56 national tax administration offices (Skatteetaten offices) in Norway by June 2020 is another socio-economic and administrative experiment that the national government and ruling political parties are raring to push, in the name of efficiency gains.
The first major problem I see for this proposal to succeed as the proponents would want it to be is its timing: this is slated to take effect in June 2020, which is less than five months after the official start of the merger of municipalities and counties — which is so far the biggest socio-economic and political experiment the Norwegian government has embarked on in recent years to further improve the country´s social welfare system.
I was one of the many Norwegian citizens who have supported this merger of municipalities in the name of building up a more stable social welfare system in the long-term, but I did that with the expectation that all other things would remain relatively stable. There´s a limit to what the local districts as social and business communities could tolerate with so many major reforms affecting local life and business procedures taking place all at once. With upheavals in the world´s politics, economics, and climate always surprising everyone almost each day, the least national governments could do for their residents is to help provide stable frameworks, rules, and expectations. Norway may have abundant cash, oil, and fish resources at the moment, but these don´t insulate Norway from external shocks that are currently rocking other parts of the world. Norway doesn´t need internal shocks as well that may displace current businesses and domestic residents who are happily living and thriving in the districts outside the major cities, just because the finance ministry thinks it is wise to cut down the number of employees in the municipalities and tax administration offices serving the Norwegian citizens in the areas of tax collection and control.
The association of Norwegian tax collectors and municipal economists (Norges kemner- og kommuneøkonomers forbund or NKK) that has members in over 400 Norwegian municipalities, has opposed this move, on the grounds that the forecast efficiency gains will be drowned by the expected effectivity losses.
https://nkkf.no/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/KOM19-09.pdf
The sad thing is, many ordinary citizens in Norway may not even be aware of this big change that is about to alter their lives or the way they do business transactions with the government in the areas of tax collection and control, because the mainstream media has not been actively covering this issue.
While the finance ministry and the government parties supporting this move may downplay the expected effectivity losses the NKK has warned about, the reduction in the number of the municipal-based tax collectors and tax controllers, and the concentration of their function in just 56 offices of Skatteetaten around Norway — will mean longer routes and queues for local business and residents to obtain easy and immediate help for their tax concerns and issues.
One can wonder, why rock the boat when it is sailing so well. Some changes may be good, but not if there were too many of these happening at the same time.
