Greece fell six spots in this year’s “Doing Business” report, issued by the World Bank, dropping to 67th place out of 190 countries surveyed, with the categories of paying taxes, enforcement of business contracts and registering of property the biggest obstacles to entrepreneurship in the still bailout-dependent country.
Greece was ahead of Vietnam and behind Bahrain in the rankingw.
The rankings for all economies are benchmarked to June 2017, the WB said.
On the “bright side”, the study praises the fact that a unified social security entity was finally established in the country, more-or-less bring various primary and supplementary pension funds under one roof.
Creation of the fund, called EFKA, allowed Greece to climb 19 spots in the category of “starting a business”.
On the down side, the World Bank noted that Greek businesses fork over 51.7 percent of their revenues towards taxes and social security contributions. Additionally, 193 work hours, on average, are needed for a business to deal with its various tax obligations.
High tax rates – aggravated by 2016’s “tax tsunami” – are also exacerbated by the fact that Greek businesses find it increasingly difficult to acquire credit lines from domestic lenders.
