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It is inappropriate to compare the Bulgarian or Albanian tax system to the Greek one. They have no common basis for comparison and 10% flat tax rate is not applicable to a developed country like Greece. This was stated by the Minister of Regional Development and Competitiveness Michalis Chrysohoidis at the forum on funding the local entrepreneurship in the new economic conditions in Greece. Opportunities for attracting investments and achieving positive economic growth in the next few years were discussed at the forum.  
 
Minister Chrysohoidis had to answer a journalist's question about how he intended to attract new foreign investors with the tax policy applied. Like other politicians before him, he decided that attack is the best form of protection and said that if Greece was compared with other Balkan countries the average wage would be considered too.  

"Corporation tax in Bulgaria is 10% but the average salary I think is about 120 euros," said the Minister of Economy. With this statement Michalis Chrysohoidis expressed the opinion of the whole Greek nation which is not yet ready to give up any of the benefits of cheap credits, nor the opportunity to live with what it produces and exports.
 
"We have been part of the European Community for many years and can not compare with our neighbours," Chrysohoidis explained further as to why successful businessmen in Greece are subject to 40% personal income tax and 24% on corporate earnings. He repeated and said for the third time that there were significant differences between Greece and other Balkan countries but forgot to note that the Bulgarian budget deficit for 2010 is about 3.8% of GDP and the Greek one is 15.4% of GDP. According to him, countries like Bulgaria, Albania and even Turkey had begun rebuilding their economies from very low levels 20 years ago which left them far behind Greece in economic, historical and socio-political terms.

The Deputy Minister of Finance and head of the Audit Court Filipos Sahianidis also commented on the issues of economic growth, foreign investment attracting and national economy recovery. He explained that Greece was in the middle of a very hard fiscal consolidation program. It had two main features - increasing tax revenues and cutting spending. The ultimate goal was to reduce the budget deficit and to restore the "healthy" economic development - not by increasing consumption but by supporting productivity.

"Efforts should be aimed at attracting foreign capital and increasing exports," said the Deputy Minister. According to him, this was the only way for establishing a sustainable economic structure in the future. Sahianidis said that banks would play a very important role in the recovery process and that they had responded very quickly to the new challenges to the national economy. He emphasized on the capital adequacy increased by some banks, the cut costs and the enterprising finding of alternative funding beside the familiar option offered by the European Central Bank for the purchase of Greek government bonds.

The Chief Executive of Eurobank EFG and Vice President of the Union of Greek Bankers Nikos Nanopoulous expressed the Greek business willingness to support the process of recovery and development. He stressed that banks in Greece were strong and availed the necessary capital to meet the needs of local entrepreneurs, regardless of the difficult economic situation and the general lack of market liquidity. "Banks will support the public sector initiatives to recover positive economic growth in the fastest way. Surely, the national economy will recover. The Greek banking system has the power to assume the due responsibilities and to continue to be a stability factor in the Greek economy," said Nanopoulous.

The meeting on funding the local entrepreneurship in the new economic conditions in Greece was organized on the initiative of the Ministry of Regional Development and Competitiveness. It was intended to present the new financial institution called National Fund for Entrepreneurship Development which the socialist PASOK government has established to support small and medium enterprises. The fund will provide low interest loans to financially adequate enterprises or new business ventures. Priority will be given to innovative projects and those which will operate in the fields of education, high technologies, industry and agriculture.

The National Fund for Entrepreneurship Development has a budget of 1.6 billion euros for 2011. The loans it will grant will be at interest rates significantly lower than the effective market interest rates. Approved entrepreneurs will be able to get a loan up to 100,000 euros for 10 years and if the interest rate on the banking market is 8% they will receive the loan at 4%. The Fund will not provide loans directly but will use the national banking system. The ten banks that will be included in the project will be announced by the end of the month. The Fund has four main programs that are aimed at providing ready money to various sectors of the economy.

The Entrepreneurship Programme has a budget of 400 million euros for small and medium enterprises. Partner banks of the fund will allocate another 800 million euros to this program, providing 1.2 billion euros to support small enterprises in the country. The Savings Program provides 800 million euros to households and small companies to improve energy efficiency of buildings in Greece. It will be launched on February 1, 2011. It is expected to recover to some extent employment in the construction sector which was seriously affected by the recession and registered a drop of more than 30%.