Non-refundable grants disbursed during the two worst years of the pandemic, 2020 and 2021, were closed to EUR 25 billion. Indeed, the result is mainly due to the recently updated of 2021 figure. In facts, taking into account even the credits and bonuses distributed in the last period of the year, the originally sum of EUR 12.7 billion rises by 21%, passing the 15 billion mark and therefore much higher than the previous 2021 figure.
Particularly, about EUR 2.6 billion (€ 2,654,047,901) were disbursed in the last period of 2021, an increase, as already said, of 20.91% compared to the total estimated in the previous update which stopped at € 12,695,534,853. The latest payments mainly concerned contributions for Equalisation, Tourism and Closed Activities.
What are the non-refundable grants – Originally, in 2020, non-refundable grants were introduced for individuals whose business/self-employed work generated a turnover of up to € 5 million and who recorded at least a 33% drop in revenues in April 2020 compared with April 2019. This grant, like the following ones, was paid by the Italian Revenue Agency, applying a percentage to the difference between the turnover/remuneration amount in April 2020 and the turnover/remuneration amount in April 2019.
This percentage was fixed equal to 20% for those with revenues/remuneration not exceeding €400 thousand, 15% for those with revenues/remuneration of between € 400 thousand and € 1 million and 10% for those with revenues/remuneration of between € 1 million and € 5 million. However, the minimum grant amount would not be less than € 1,000 for individuals and € 2,000 for entities.
This at first, then in the following months and in 2021, the non-refundable grants increased in either number or characteristics.
Looking at regional data - The region receiving the largest share of non-refundable grants in 2021 is Lombardy (€ 3,171,267,365), followed by Lazio (€ 1,617,317,622), Veneto (€ 1,483,497,511), Campania (€ 1,259,045,717), Emilia Romagna (€ 1,258,814,413) and Tuscany (€ 1,245,521,274).
Instead, the greatest increase in percentage terms in the contributions paid out occurred in Trentino Alto Adige (+35.23%) followed by Veneto (+27.43%), Emilia Romagna (+27.27%), Lombardy (+26.70%) and Friuli Venezia Giulia (+26.65%).
The equalization grant - The increase in the last period of 2021 is mainly due to the amounts paid to taxpayers who applied for the so-called Perequativo relief, or equalization non-refundable grant. The amount of this contribution was commensurate with the deterioration of the operating result for the tax year 2020 compared to the previous tax year, net of the Covid-19 contributions already received. In 2021, the total equitable contribution paid out amounts to almost 2.9 billion, of which about 2.5 billion in the last period alone (+623%).
Stefano Latini