Number one taxes on wages, cafeteria plans and misguided ‘ flexible ’ remuneration policies, cash for cars and mobility bonuses, denounced tax rulings ... When the refusal to acknowledge the problem leads to an impasse ...

One must see these politicians, these lawyers, these specialists in "compensation and benefits," so happy to sell us cash-for-cars schemes, mobility bonuses, cafeteria plans, and compensation with "points" as the ultimate solution that will make everyone happy.

The raw truth is revealed by Eurostat and the OECD. First, Belgium ranks second among the countries with the highest taxes, and second, it ranks first in the taxation of income from employment (social security contributions and combined taxes). This is despite the tax shift...

At the same time, the Belgian tax administration itself questions the tax rulings regarding stock options or cafeteria plans (BNP Paribas is currently in active discussions regarding its compensation system). To the extent that the departure of the Minister of Finance was required.

If Belgium today is the paradise for alternative compensation, it is indeed because compensation is heavily taxed. And this has been the case for a long time...

Cafeteria plans and other compensation systems "with points" or "flexible" are in fashion. These supposedly allow employees to choose, based on their life needs, between various benefits "that are more favorably taxed," such as company cars, group insurance plans, stock options or warrants, additional child allowances, additional vacation days, services for small tasks, etc. However, in reality, this is merely hypocrisy that masks a constant shift, accelerating the movement of cash compensation — heavily taxed — into "something else."

I say this: employees — if they had the choice — would prefer to have cash in their pockets with the freedom to do with it what they want, when they want, rather than being forced to opt for pre-set formulas, baskets of benefits supposedly in their best interest.

All these formulas do is limit the employee's freedom to dispose of their salary freely. And this is because this salary is so heavily taxed that everyone in Belgium is desperately looking for ways to improve their purchasing power, even by accepting such an intervention.

Even worse, with cash-for-cars or mobility bonuses, they manage to treat cash compensation fictively more favorably by labeling it differently, with all the questions and difficulties this raises. It would appear that no one knows what cash is anymore and what isn’t, opening the door to abuses.

And what one hand gives, the other tries to take back with rulings that are secretly exposed (witnessing a true internal war within the tax authorities), with conditions — I’m thinking of the bonus CAO 90 for example — that become stricter year after year, with additional invented conditions (I’m thinking of the 20% cap on the granting of stock options that has no legal basis), etc.

I believe we are at the limits of the system when legal certainty becomes arbitrary, employees' freedom is constrained, budgetary revenues become uncertain, and employers are pushed into a race for the optimization of compensation.

An odd discussion with a cafeteria plan specialist who actually acknowledges the infringement on the freedom to dispose of one's salary but praises the instrument of behavior modification that the state can use to encourage employees to take a smaller and more eco-friendly car (as a solution to the government's inaction regarding company cars, which are an ecological nightmare but the safety valve of the compensation system in Belgium), to save for retirement (as a solution to the limitations of the statutory pension), to take out life insurance (as a solution to the limitations of social security), to receive assistance with childcare costs (as a solution to birth policy limitations), etc....

Every job deserves a salary. One should add that every job deserves a reasonably taxed salary. This would avoid the arms race of creativity regarding alternative compensation, which ultimately only benefits the specialists in the field.