The expert assessed the consequences of banning the self-employed from working with legal entities

Limiting the regime of the self-employed to providing services to individuals only can lead to an increase in shadow employment and an increase in the burden on small businesses. Ekaterina Kosareva, Managing partner of the VMT Consult agency, told Izvestia on February 24.

According to her, such a measure will actually reshape the existing system of professional income tax (NAP), which was originally conceived as a tool to bring the self-employed out of the shadows.

"If the self-employed are banned from working with legal entities and individual entrepreneurs, some people will not stop doing their jobs, but simply go into the informal sector. Not everyone is ready to register an individual entrepreneur on a simplified basis or acquire a patent with an income of up to 2.4 million rubles per year," the expert noted.

Kosareva said that in this case, the number of part-time employees may increase or the number of civil contracts may increase, which will increase the tax burden on both employers and performers. In addition, it is possible to transform payment schemes: services will formally be provided to individuals, such as company executives, with a tax rate of 4%. This, according to the expert, will lead to a shortfall in budget revenues and a distortion of statistics.

The self-employed themselves will also face a number of changes. Firstly, it is possible to lose part of the income due to the need to switch to other tax regimes or pay mandatory insurance premiums. Secondly, employment flexibility will decrease. Many specialists in online professions combine their main work with freelancing for companies, and a ban on such contracts may narrow the sales market.

"Even if a self—employed person is focused on services to individuals (for example, he bakes cakes), then he is limited in selling a cake and treats for a holiday to organizations (who wanted to make a purchase according to the law), and this threatens to collapse the sales market and lose customers in the future," explained Kosareva.

The expert also pointed out the increasing administrative burden during the transition to a simplified system: accounting, filing declarations and document management require additional knowledge and resources. At the same time, the self—employed remain a socially vulnerable category today - they do not receive seniority and pension points, there is no paid leave, and in order to receive sick leave, they must voluntarily pay contributions to the Social Fund.

According to Kosareva, the budget implications also remain ambiguous. Not all NAP payers are ready to re—register - some may return to informal employment. As a result, one of the key incentives of the special regime will be lost — the withdrawal of income from the shadows and the expansion of the tax base.

On the same day, Yaroslav Nilov, head of the State Duma Committee on Labor, Social Policy and Veterans' Affairs, proposed limiting the regime of the self-employed to services for individuals and revising its parameters. He believes that this procedure should apply to services provided only to individuals (services of nannies, tutors, household assistants), and activities related to the rental of residential and commercial real estate.

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