KINGSTON, Jamaica- The Government has announced a reverse tax credit of $20,000 for individuals earning less than $3 million per annum.

“The reverse tax credit means that every registered taxpayer who, in a completed fiscal year, did their part in contributing to society, whether through PAYE or being self-employed and who earn under that threshold, this government will provide them a reverse tax credit of $20, 000,” said Finance and Public Service Minister Dr Nigel Clarke.

He was speaking Tuesday as he opened the 2024/25 Budget Debate in the House of Representatives.

Clarke said there are 570,000 Jamaicans who contribute to the society through statutory deductions and some through personal income tax who will benefit from this measure.

“The cost of this programme is $11.4 billion and we (the government) consider this money well spent,” he said.

The finance minister noted that reverse tax credits exist in other countries but was being implemented for the first time in Jamaica. He said there will be an established system for the processing and payment of the tax credit that will be managed by Tax Administration Jamaica.

He said that it will take some time to set up before it is ready “because we want to set it up in a way that is durable so that the mechanism can be potentially available again in the future”.

According to Clarke, this was the Administration’s way of “leveraging the macro-economic stability to the people’s benefit”.