The governing parties are keen to warn voters about tax increases if the opposition wins the election.
According to the Social Democrats' candidate for finance minister, Mikael Damberg, growth and job creation are the most important recipes for ensuring the state has money for welfare.
But tax changes that "are reasonable", such as capital being taxed more in relation to labour, may also be needed, according to Damberg.
Warns about property taxes
Among other things, the party wants to phase out the earned income tax deduction for people earning 67,000 kronor a month and up. According to Damberg, the proposal means "barely a hundred kronor" extra in tax for those earning 70,000 kronor a month.
So it's nothing. But if you earn 200,000 to 250,000 kronor a month, then it's money.
S has also proposed a contingency tax to finance the military buildup. According to Mikael Damberg, however, the party is not "locked to a model", but rather the principle that a defence expansion must be financed jointly "if it is not to be taken from healthcare or elderly care."
And it doesn't come from any party, he says.
Leading Moderates have also warned that a property tax is something the Social Democrats are talking about "behind locked doors", despite the party leadership having repeatedly said no to such a thing.
Mikael Damberg says he knows it is "all economists' favourite tax", but that there are problems with such a tax. Among other things, there is a discussion that people on lower incomes would not be able to afford to stay in their homes.
It is also a tax that is levied on assets that you have, not on capital income.
"We have previously gone to elections, many elections ago, on various small changes to the property tax, but it didn't turn out well. It gave the impression that we somehow didn't respect the fact that people actually live in their properties," he says.
Move money around
If the election goes S' way, the party wants to invite the other parties in parliament to a broad tax review. The party has previously talked about revising the so-called 3:12 rules, which make it more advantageous for entrepreneurs to withdraw dividends instead of wages.
According to Damberg, a review is about achieving a more efficient tax system by removing various exemptions. According to him, this could result in lower taxes overall by making it more difficult to move money around to avoid taxes.
According to Damberg, it's basically about "helping each other out".
I meet a lot of people with higher incomes who think it's completely okay, because they also think that society has to hold together in some way, he says.
