According to the Iranian regime’s Tax Authority, 135,509 luxury residential units and garden villas have been subjected to taxes amounting to 44.63 trillion rials (approximately $69.8 million), of which only 940 billion rials (approximately $1.471 million) have been collected.
According to the organization, the threshold for luxury home tax in 2024, based on the budget law, is set at 350 billion rials (approximately $547,730). All residential units and garden villas valued above this amount must pay taxes on the excess.
Failure to pay taxes by luxury homeowners comes at a time when reports show that tax evasion by the wealthy has become commonplace. According to the Tax Authority, in the spring of 2024, government revenues from income and salary taxes grew by 15%, revenues from goods and services taxes grew by 36.5%, while wealth tax revenues dropped by 28.5%.
Government performance indicates that in recent years, due to the decline in foreign exchange revenues, the regime has focused its efforts on collecting taxes to cover some of its ongoing expenses.
On September 24, the head of Iran’s Tax Authority stated that the organization’s revenue collection in the first half of this year had increased by 49% compared to the same period last year, saying: “We collected a total of 511.389 trillion rials (approximately $8 billion), which is about 1.67 quadrillion rials (around $2.6 billion) more than the same period last year.”
In May 2024, *Mehr News Agency* reported that government tax revenues had risen from 1.09 quadrillion rials (about $1.7 billion) in 2018 to about 8.06 quadrillion rials (around $12.6 billion), marking a 740% increase over six years.
While tax revenues have increased, many experts believe that the government does not provide services commensurate with the amount of taxes collected. Moreover, there is no transparency or report on how tax revenues are being spent.
This comes at a time when a significant portion of the economy, estimated by experts to account for over 50% of Iran’s total economy, is under the control of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and exempt from taxes. In fact, the largest share of tax evasion relates to the assets of the regime’s leaders.
