Space in the Tax System: The Appearance of Regional Thinking in a Document of the Ministry of Finance

Abstract

Since 1996 the Hungarian Ministry of Finance put down a directive for the tax office (APEH) regarding the self-employed private individuals to supplement their income tax returns. According to this document one has to be called upon, whose returned income does not meet the limit which is equivalent to the minimum wages, professional and regional characteristics.

The importance of this document is that the Ministry of Finance – as a governmental institution – begins to recognise the importance of regional inequalities in its own thinking. The ministry uses such notions as: settlement-size categories, counties, preferential areas of regional development and politics (etc.).