The US State Department, in a rare comment on Iran’s domestic financial policy, criticized a new law imposing capital gains taxes on real estate, vehicles, foreign currency, precious metals and cryptocurrencies, saying it would add to citizens’ hardships.
“By taxing the very assets people depend on for financial stability, the regime’s policies place an even greater burden on them,” it said in a statement posted on its Persian-language account on X Tuesday.
It said this decision "clearly demonstrates the regime’s disregard for the welfare of its citizens."
"Years of economic mismanagement and corruption have severely devalued Iran’s currency and forced many Iranians to rely on these assets as a hedge against inflation," the statement added.
The criticism comes as Iran introduced a new law making inflation partly taxable.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian formally signed the tax bill last month, after it was passed by parliament in late June.
The law targets capital gains on real estate, vehicles, gold, jewelry, silver, platinum, foreign currency and even cryptocurrencies. However, the law imposes tax not only on capital gains but also on half of the inflation-driven increases to asset prices.
Iran faces one of the highest inflation rates in the region. According to the International Monetary Fund's estimates, the annual inflation rate has averaged above 42% since 2020.
Since 2021, when the late-president Ebrahim Raisi took to power, the Iranian government’s tax revenues increased by over 300%.
Experts say inflation is one reason behind the increase in taxes, but argue that even after adjusting for inflation, the government should have raised taxation by at most 160%, not 326%.
