by Felix Richter, Statista.com
— this post authored by Niall McCarthy
According to figures released by the European Commission last week, €159.5 billion in Value Added Tax (VAT) revenue was lost across the EU in 2014.
Calls by the Commission to overhaul and improve the EU’s VAT system have grown louder after the unacceptably high figure was released. In percentage terms, the VAT gap was highest in Romania (37.9 percent) and lowest in Sweden (1.2 percent).
In absolute terms, however, Italy came first with €36.9 billion in uncollected VAT with France in second place (€24.5 billion) and Germany rounding off the top three (€23.5 billion). The EU member states with the lowest absolute VAT gap in 2014 were Slovenia (€280 million), Estonia (€181 million) and Luxembourg (€147 million).
This chart shows the estimated VAT gap in the European Union in 2014.
You will find more statistics at Statista.