DPRK--Only Tax-free Country

Korean Central News Agency of DPRK via Korea News Service (KNS)

Pyongyang, March 20 (KCNA) -- The people of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea enjoy a happy life, not knowing what the tax is like. It is the reality of Korea that people do not know the rent while living in modern houses built at the state's expenses and even receive scholarships from the state while studying at universities, far from paying fees. Though the country is undergoing difficulties today, there is no change in the policies of the Party and the state typically represented by free medical care and free education. On the contrary, new popular measures are taken.

This is unthinkable apart from the people-centered Korean style socialist system. The tax system in the DPRK was totally abolished on April 1, Juche 63 (1974). The law of the Supreme People's Assembly "On Totally Abolishing the Tax System" was promulgated at the third session of the Fifth Supreme People's Assembly of the DPRK held in Pyongyang on March 21 that year.

The tax system has been in force in all the countries for thousands of years with the appearance of states. Its complete repeal in the DPRK was the first of its kind in human history.

With the enforcement of this law, the DPRK has earned the proud name "the only country without tax".

On the 32nd anniversary of its promulgation, the Korean people retrospect the immortal feats of President Kim Il Sung, the supreme incarnation of love for the people. As far back as the days of the anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle, Kim Il Sung stipulated the establishment of a just tax system in the Ten-point Programme of the Association for the Restoration of the Fatherland.

After the liberation of the country, he abolished the predatory tax system of the Japanese imperialists and established a popular and democratic one. He also reduced the tax burdens of the people step by step while consolidating the economic foundation of the country.

In 1955 the income tax upon the workers and office employees was cut sharply, the tax levies upon the handicraftsmen, businessmen and merchants were cut down by a wide margin and agricultural tax in kind was trimmed back to 20.1 percent on an average. Later, the agricultural tax in kind that had remained partially and the negligible income tax of the workers and office employees were scrapped.