As a social stabilizer, insurance is an important part of the national economy. It is closely related to all sectors and links of the national economy, especially to finance and taxation.

Insurance and tax are two major sources of social reserve funds. Social reserve funds are divided into three types: centralized reserve funds, decentralized self-insurance reserve funds and insurance reserve funds. The insurance fund formed by collecting premiums from policyholders and the state's centralized reserves in the form of taxes are important components of social reserves, together with decentralized self-insurance reserves. ......

Abstract: The experience of the world insurance industry shows that the development level of a country's insurance industry is not unrelated to its related tax policies. Based on the relevant tax regulations on insurance products in some western countries, this paper analyzes the causes and results of the influence of preferential tax policies on insurance demand and tax sources from two aspects of theory and practice, and puts forward some policy suggestions to improve tax laws and regulations, stimulate the development of insurance demand and provide analytical methods for micro-subjects' financial planning.

Keywords: insurance tax, life insurance income tax, financial planning, enterprise supplementary endowment insurance

Insurance and taxation are two important phenomena in economic life. They belong to different levels: insurance is a micro-level economic activity, the insured pays the premium and the insurer is responsible for paying the premium; Taxation is a macroeconomic activity that the state collects taxes from taxpayers according to relevant laws and regulations. Although they are different in nature and content, there is a close relationship between them, which affects and restricts each other. It is precisely because of this relationship that different tax policies for the insurance industry will have a great impact on a country's tax sources and insurance demand. This paper attempts to explore this connection and its influence.

First, the theoretical analysis of the relationship between insurance and taxation

The relationship between insurance and tax is mutual. On the one hand, insurance, as a social stabilizer, undertakes the function of economic compensation, that is, it can make up for the economic losses caused by various natural disasters and accidents, help damaged enterprises to resume production in time, and thus ensure the source of tax revenue; Of course, the insurance industry itself is also one of the tax sources, in which the insurer's premium income, business income and insurance income of some policyholders or insured persons are all taxable objects stipulated by the tax law; In addition, the insurer's premium income is an important part of the total social capital. If it is directly or indirectly invested in other industries, it will promote the development of other industries and even the emergence of emerging industries, and indirectly expand the tax sources. This is of great practical significance to our country at this stage.

On the other hand, a country's tax policy, especially for the insurance industry, has a wide and far-reaching impact on the country's insurance industry. First of all, different tax rates will have different effects. Generally speaking, if a country imposes a higher business tax rate or income tax rate on insurance companies, it will reduce their after-tax profits, thus reducing the accumulation capacity of insurance accumulation funds. As insurance accumulation fund is an important part of insurance solvency, it will inevitably affect the solvency of insurance companies in the long run. This hinders the cultivation of the main body of insurance market and the stability of insurance market. Secondly, discriminatory tax policies will have different effects. If a country implements different income tax rates for domestic and foreign insurance companies, it will destroy the important foundation of the insurance market order-fair competition, and unfair competition will affect the establishment of a standardized and orderly insurance market; If a country implements a uniform tax rate for all types of insurance, it will be difficult to reflect the country's policy orientation for all types of insurance, which will make it difficult for the insurance industry development policy to match the national economic development plan, meet the needs of the national economic development direction, and is not conducive to the improvement of the insurance industry development policy. Thirdly, whether enterprises and residents have preferential tax policies to buy insurance will affect the effective expansion of insurance demand. If the insurance premiums of enterprises and residents in a country can be deducted from their income as expenses, but the insurance premiums can not be included in their income, then this will stimulate the enthusiasm of enterprises and residents to buy insurance, thus expanding the effective demand for insurance.

From the above analysis, we can see that the interaction between insurance and tax mainly affects the tax source as a tax source and the insurance demand as a driving force for the development of the insurance industry. The tax policy of insurance industry is the main motivation of this interaction. If a country wants to increase taxes, it may raise the tax rate, but this will inhibit the development of the insurance industry and may even have an impact on other tax sources in the long run; If a country wants to promote the development of the insurance industry, it may reduce the tax rate and introduce preferential tax policies to stimulate the demand for insurance and the development of the insurance industry, but this may reduce the tax revenue in the short term. It can be seen that there is a contradictory and unified relationship among tax sources, insurance industry development and insurance demand. In the long run, they are mutually reinforcing. Therefore, the best strategy is to give preferential policies to the insurance industry as much as possible under the condition of ensuring a certain tax source, so as to promote the insurance demand and development of the insurance industry, and increase the tax source as much as possible under the premise of ensuring a certain development speed of the insurance industry.

Second, the empirical analysis of insurance tax policy on insurance demand and fiscal revenue.

1. An Empirical Analysis of the Impact of Insurance Tax Policy on Insurance Demand

In countries with a sound tax system, citizens have developed an atmosphere of paying taxes, and at the same time seek reasonable ways to avoid taxes. The reason why they care about taxes is mainly for their own interests. If the tax incentives provided by the state for insurance products are conducive to taxpayers' financial planning, as a rational economic man, it is bound to increase the consumption of such products.

For example, in the case that endowment insurance has the advantage of delaying the payment of income tax, because in most countries, the general income tax rate of individuals adopts excessive progressive tax rate. Usually, a person's income during work is higher than his retirement income, so he may have some income in an individual retirement account (IRA). IRA's annuity can offset taxable income, thus reducing the taxable income of income tax during personal work. When an individual receives cash from his account after retirement, his income is usually lower than that during his working period, and he will be taxed at a lower tax rate.

When taxpayers make financial planning for themselves, they will definitely use their own funds to buy endowment insurance, thus expanding the insurance demand. Regarding whether the insurance indemnity obtained by the insured is taxable, the Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) stipulates that the indemnity obtained by an individual can be deducted before calculating the taxable income, that is, the insurance indemnity is exempt from personal income tax. For example, A bought insurance for his new car, with a service life of 10 year and a value of 10 million, and the car was stolen after one year's use. The insurance company pays compensation of 80,000 yuan to A after depreciation according to the straight-line method. This 80,000 yuan is the insurance company's compensation for A's losses, not A's income, so tax exemption is also appropriate.

China's upcoming inheritance tax will also stimulate people's demand for life insurance. Inheritance tax is different from other taxes in nature, and its particularity lies in the fact that inheritance tax requires its taxpayers to have the ability to pay taxes. The so-called ability to pay taxes means that the heirs must have enough tax money when accepting the inheritance. In other words, the heirs can't pay taxes with the inherited property, and only after the transfer registration of all the inherited property including the payment of inheritance tax is completed can the heirs have the right to dispose of the inherited property. Therefore, the heir must raise a sum of money to pay taxes before he can get the inheritance. This problem can be solved by buying life insurance before the death. For example, in other countries in the world, such as the United States, Japan and other countries, the inheritance tax is highly progressive, generally above 40%. According to this tax rate, if you leave a beautiful house to your children, you may have to sell it or give up inheritance because you can't afford the inheritance tax. But if parents leave their children not only real estate, but also a high life insurance with their parents as the insured, the result will be very different.

We can see that the difference between savings, banks and insurance companies is so great. It can be seen that part of the property can legally evade a large amount of taxes through insurance companies, and the inheritance tax can be paid with insurance compensation, so as to avoid property losses caused by selling assets due to insufficient cash and preserve assets to the greatest extent.

2. Empirical analysis of the impact of insurance tax policy on fiscal revenue.

The actual influence of insurance tax policy on fiscal revenue is various. First of all, the insurance tax policy for policyholders mainly involves personal income tax and its related inheritance tax. Personal income tax includes not only the tax relief for the insured to pay the premium when purchasing social insurance and enterprise supplementary endowment insurance, but also the tax relief for the beneficiary to obtain insurance compensation or payment, and the tax relief policy for the beneficiary to obtain insurance compensation or pay inheritance tax to the property heir.

First of all, regarding the tax reduction and exemption of insurance premiums, the document Caishuizi 1997144 issued by the Ministry of Finance and State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China1997 stipulates that the housing accumulation fund, medical insurance premium and basic pension that enterprises and individuals withdraw and deliver to designated financial institutions according to the proportion stipulated by the state or local government are exempt from income tax, regardless of individual's current salary and salary income. This means that the social insurance premiums paid by enterprises and individuals can be charged before tax and included in the operating costs of enterprises. The establishment of social security system is a national plan to implement social policies and labor policies, safeguard citizens' basic survival needs and stabilize social order. Although it seems that the national finance has reduced some taxes, in fact, the national finance has not reduced income, but reduced expenditure, because the reduction of expenditure is greater than the reduction of income. The reduction in expenditure is mainly reflected in social relief and medical expenses. These expenses are paid by social insurance. Social insurance premiums are shared by enterprises, individuals and the state. The income tax exemption law can encourage those enterprises with good economic benefits to buy old-age commercial insurance for their employees, which not only provides employees with a high level of old-age security, but also relieves the worries of the country and expands the insurance demand, thus increasing the business tax levied by the finance on insurance enterprises. The social security system ensures that the problems of birth, illness, death and illness of most citizens are solved through mutual assistance and cooperation such as insurance. Therefore, exempting enterprises and individuals from social insurance premiums and exempting enterprises from personal income tax for supplementary pension insurance will reduce fiscal revenue in form, but actually increase fiscal revenue.

Secondly, granting income tax exemption to the compensation or payment of insurance benefits obtained by insurance beneficiaries can stimulate citizens' insurance demand, increase the operating income of insurance enterprises, increase the tax revenue of financial operations, and at the same time enable the families of the insured who died unfortunately to get enough economic support and continue their lives, thus reducing the burden of national civil relief, especially the collection of inheritance tax. It can greatly stimulate the income tax exemption characteristics of life insurance premiums, and the heirs need to pay a considerable inheritance tax before obtaining the ownership of the estate. For example, a person with 2 million assets (including his real estate, movable property, securities, gold and silver jewelry, antiques, trademark rights, copyright of printed books, etc.). ) It is required to pay the inheritance tax of 200,000 yuan at the tax rate of 10%, and it is required to pay cash. In this way, there is no doubt that about 5 million rich people who need to pay inheritance tax, accounting for about 0.5% of China's population of 654.38+03 billion, will become prospective customers of insurance companies, because people with assets can solve the problem of paying inheritance tax in huge cash by buying life insurance for themselves (that is, the heirs take themselves as the insured) and designating the heirs as the policy beneficiaries. This is because after the decedent has purchased life insurance, the insurance company must pay the insurance money to the beneficiary of the policy in cash within 60-70 days from the date when the beneficiary of the policy reports the case. In this way, if the progressive tax system of 30%, 40%, 50% and 60% is adopted according to the assets of 2 million, the insurance amount that each rich person needs to buy (that is, the insurance premium paid by the insurance company when the insured, that is, the heir to the estate, dies) is 600,000 yuan on average. Assuming that the payment period is ten years and the insurance company's predetermined interest rate is 2.5%, the annual payment per person is about 654.38+million yuan, which can not only ensure the smooth collection of inheritance tax, but also increase the insurance company's premium income by 500 billion yuan in 10, and also create considerable insurance company business tax (the business tax rate of finance and insurance is 5%). Specifically, the revenue from static business tax in 10 fiscal year is: (10 million yuan, 5 million insured persons, 5%) x 10 (year) = 250 billion yuan.

It can be seen that tax incentives for the insurance industry not only benefit the people, but also enrich the country, which is a win-win strategy for the country and individuals.

Third, the current situation of China's insurance tax system

(A) the current insurance tax system in China.

China's current insurance tax system was gradually established after 1983. According to the current tax law, the state mainly collects business tax and enterprise income tax on the insurance industry, and at the same time collects small taxes such as urban maintenance and construction tax and stamp duty. 1, business tax, the tax basis is all premium income. Where reinsurance business is implemented, the initial insurance business is based on the balance of all premium income MINUS the premium paid to the reinsurance acceptor. Financial industries such as insurance are uniformly taxed at 8%. Tax incentives are embodied in three aspects: first, agricultural insurance is tax-free; Second, the premium income of the return life insurance business run by insurance companies for more than one year shall be exempted from business tax; Third, the export credit insurance business is not as insurance provided by China, but as a non-taxable service, and no business tax is levied. 2. For enterprise income tax, Chinese and foreign investors apply different tax laws. Chinese insurance companies apply the tax rate of 33%, foreign insurance companies apply the tax rate of 15%, and life insurance companies are exempt from enterprise income tax. 3, stamp duty, property insurance business according to the premium income 1‰ decal, agricultural insurance contract tax-free. 4. Urban maintenance and construction tax is only applicable to Chinese-funded insurance companies, and foreign-funded insurance companies are exempt from tax.

(B) the drawbacks of China's current insurance tax system

As can be seen from the above, China's insurance tax system reflects a certain national policy orientation: in order to reduce the burden of agricultural production, it provides more tax incentives for state-supported agricultural insurance; For insurance with social security function, such as life insurance that can be surrendered, income tax, business tax and stamp duty are reduced or exempted. However, China's current insurance-related tax policies also have disadvantages: First, the tax burden is unfair. There is little difference between business tax and stamp duty of Chinese and foreign insurance companies, but there is a big difference between enterprise income tax and urban construction tax. 1, with different tax rates. Chinese and foreign insurance companies apply two sets of enterprise income tax laws respectively, but there are many differences in the specific provisions of the two sets of income tax laws, which leads to a huge tax gap between Chinese and foreign insurance companies. Foreign-funded insurance companies enjoy the tax preference of "exemption from two and reduction from three", and even after the five-year relief period, they are still taxed at the income tax rate of 15%; But now the income tax of Chinese insurance companies is unified at 33%. It is obviously unfair for Chinese companies to compete with powerful foreign companies for high tax burden.

2. The tax base is different. Chinese and foreign insurance companies pay different income taxes in terms of taxable wages, employee welfare expenses, donation expenses, business entertainment expenses and depreciation of fixed assets. Generally speaking, the tax conditions of foreign enterprises are relatively relaxed, while those of China enterprises are relatively harsh.

At present, the maximum monthly deduction of taxable wages per capita of Chinese-funded companies is 550 yuan, and individual economically developed areas (provincial level) can report to the Ministry of Finance for approval, and the increase will be within the range of no more than 20%, and the employee welfare expenses will be deducted according to 14% of taxable wages; However, the wages and welfare fees paid by foreign-funded companies to employees have no provisions in this respect, and only the payment standards need to be submitted and approved by the local tax authorities before they can be collected.

In terms of donation expenditure, the donation expenditure of Chinese-funded insurance companies for public welfare and disaster relief can be deducted according to the facts within the standard of not exceeding 65,438+0.5% of the taxable income of the company in the current year (3% for other non-financial Chinese-funded enterprises), and the excess part cannot be deducted; Donations made by foreign-funded insurance companies for public welfare and relief can be fully included in the current expenses.

In terms of depreciation of fixed assets, it is stipulated that the depreciation residual value of Chinese insurance companies is generally not higher than 5% of the original price, and the depreciation residual value of foreign insurance companies is not lower than 10% of the original price. (4) In terms of business entertainment expenses, Chinese-funded companies are divided into four categories according to their annual operating income, namely, less than150,000 yuan (excluding), between150,000 yuan and 50 million yuan (excluding), and between 50 million yuan and1000 million yuan and above, which are operated in different intervals. Foreign-funded insurance companies are divided into two categories according to their annual business income. If the total annual business income is less than 5 million yuan, it shall not exceed 65,438+00 ‰ of the total business income, and the part of the total business income exceeding 5 million yuan shall not exceed 5‰. The deduction standard is significantly higher than that of Chinese insurance companies.

3. Foreign insurance companies can enjoy reinvestment tax refund. Foreign-funded insurance companies directly reinvest the profits from the company's operations to increase their registered capital, or start other foreign-invested enterprises as capital investment. If the operating period is not less than 5 years, 40% of the income tax paid by its investment can be refunded. 4. Chinese-funded insurance companies have to pay the urban maintenance and construction tax attached to the business tax, while foreign-funded insurance companies are exempt from the urban maintenance and construction tax. Second, the tax burden is biased. 1983 before the tax reform, the state once regarded the insurance industry as a special industry, and levied 55% enterprise income tax, half of which was turned over to the central finance and the other half to the local finance; At the same time, 15% fixed assets investment direction adjustment tax and 5% business tax are levied. After the tax reform, PICC applies 55% corporate income tax, Pacific Insurance applies 33% corporate income tax, and Ping An Insurance applies 15%. At the same time, 5% business tax and 15% adjustment tax are levied on fixed assets investment direction. At the beginning of 1997, the unified income tax rate of China insurance companies was 33%, but the business tax was raised from 5% to 8% accordingly, and the actual tax burden remained high. The business tax rate of 8% is applicable to the insurance industry and other financial industries in China, which is higher than 3% applicable to post and telecommunications, culture and sports, construction and installation, and transportation, and 5% applicable to service industry, intangible assets transfer and real estate sales. Moreover, the tax basis of insurance business tax is premium income, and a considerable part of premium income is paid to the insured in the form of indemnity or payment, which is different from the tax basis of deposit-loan spread in financial industry, so the actual tax burden of insurance industry is higher than that of financial industry. The stamp duty rate applicable to the insurance industry is also very high. Stamp duty is based on premium income, and the actual tax burden is higher. With the increasingly open market and fierce competition, the high tax burden of the insurance industry undoubtedly increases the industry risks of the insurance industry, which is obviously contrary to the reality that the level of China's insurance industry is still very low, the insurance market has broad prospects and needs further encouragement.

4. China's tax law and tax-related regulations are not clear about the tax provisions of insurance products.

The Individual Income Tax Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) 1980 was passed in September and revised in September 1993. The corresponding tax provisions for insurance products are also limited to Article 4, which stipulates that "insurance claims can be exempted from personal income tax". Literally, insurance indemnity only refers to the compensation for the loss and damage of the subject matter insured in property insurance, excluding the insurance premium paid by life insurance products. That is, there is no corresponding provision for insurance payment of life insurance products. Although in the actual operation process, the payment of insurance benefits does not need to pay income tax, which is regarded as tax-free items. But this is not caused by preferential tax policies, but by legal inaction. Fuzzy regulations have formed a gray area in the collection, which is not conducive to policy guidance. At the same time, it has affected the effective expansion of insurance demand and failed to provide the necessary policy environment for transferring the part of people's savings with insurance factors to the insurance market. (3) The state is stepping up the formulation of relevant laws and regulations.

200 1 June1released in State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China, People's Republic of China (PRC).