Archive of articles - February 2012, page 2
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Students in Tvrdošín protest against their cold school
Students attending the Tvrdošín Joint Comprehensive School, which brought together the previously separate Electro-Technical Vocational School and Business Academy, had shortened lessons in mid February due to persistent freezing temperatures and cold classrooms. About one quarter of the 600 students protested in front of school on February 13, refusing to go to classes, resulting in a negotiated agreement with school officials that reduced the length of lessons by one-third.
State seeks more effective tax collection
GLOBALISATION, the financial and economic crisis and reduced government budgets do not make it easy to enforce a country’s tax laws and catch tax cheats. Slovakia certainly faces these problems, and says it realises that more efficient and effective tax collection is not only a way to increase state revenue but is also a key to a healthier business environment.
'Sasanka' videos hit the internet
THE HEAD of Freedom and Solidarity (SaS), Richard Sulík, was reportedly prepared to support a government headed by Ivan Mikloš, the current finance minister from the Slovak Democratic and Christian Union (SDKÚ) party.
FinMin: Tax hikes are unavoidable
SLOVAKIA will not be able to cut its budget deficit without an increase in some tax rates, Finance Minister Ivan Mikloš said at a meeting organised by the Trend economic weekly on February 14.“Those saying that we can manage without raising taxes don’t quite know what they’re talking about,” Mikloš stated, as quoted by the TASR newswire.
Tax delinquencies rise in Slovakia
ECONOMIC progress seems to have brought an increase in various kinds of financial crime to Slovakia, particularly in the area of taxation, as data from the Interior Ministry released in February indicates that tax delinquencies grew by 60 percent from 2010 to 2011.
National Career Days: goldfield of young employees
One of the most successful job fairs “National Career Days” (NDK) is event organized by AIESEC Slovakia. This year it celebrates its 17th Annual and again provides companies and students with opportunity to have their first contact. By this event, companies have opportunity to present themselves as one of the employers in Slovak market, find new talented and potential employees and raise awareness of its brand and products. There are different ways how company can participate on NDK, it all depends on concrete needs of the company, as the scale of participation is very broad.
Change schools' funding, says think tank
THE JOBLESS rate in Slovakia has been affected by many different factors. These range from the economic crisis to the less-than-perfect state of the education system, according to Michal Páleník, director of the Employment Institute, a labour-market think tank. The Slovak Spectator spoke to Páleník about the high jobless rate in Slovakia and measures that could help to reduce it.
Taxes in Slovakia
Value added tax (VAT)Basic VAT rate: 20 percentReduced VAT rate on books and medicines: 10 percent
Court orders bar owner to apologise
THE OWNER of a bar in Spišské Vlachy must issue an apology to a Roma customer, Roman Pecha, after the bar refused to serve the patron and a group he was with, the district court in Spišská Nová Ves ruled. The text of the apology must also be displayed at a visible spot in the bar as well as in regional newspapers. It must state that he violated the country’s antidiscrimination law, the Sme daily reported.
Educating the next generation of scientists and engineers
Robert Redhammer says that public perceptions clearly play a role when students choose their fields of study: when there is a lot of promotion and talk about the information technology sector, then interest grows. “If we do not talk enough about the need for flood protection and dams, then it is natural that people are not interested in studying these engineering disciplines even though the need for these professions is immense,” said Redhammer, the rector of the Slovak University of Technology (STU) in Bratislava, the country’s oldest technical university.
Slovakia’s food independence falls
IF SLOVAKIA’S food independence does not improve, the state will not be able to feed its citizens in coming years, according to Milan Semančík, the chair of the Slovak Agriculture and Food Chamber (SPPK). He warned that low food independence would also endanger the country’s food security, the Hospodárske Noviny daily reported.
Interest in tax assignment rises
THE NUMBER of organisations that qualify to receive 2 percent assigned from income taxes has grown. All taxpayers in Slovakia – individuals as well as corporations – can assign 2 percent of their income tax to a good cause of their choice. 10,962 civic organisations, NGOs, non-investment funds, foundations and other organisations can receive tax assignments for 2011. Compared with the previous year this is an increase of almost 14 percent, the TASR newswire wrote, citing data from the Chamber of Notaries.
Question marks over investments
BIG foreign companies could reconsider their plans to invest in Slovakia if they do not receive more investment aid from the government, the Hospodárske Noviny daily wrote. The cabinet of Iveta Radičová has postponed a decision whether to award new state aid of €28 million to Galanta-based Samsung, explaining that the company, which has already received aid in the past, does not plan to create any new jobs, the daily reported.
Bojnice Castle welcomes Valentine lovers
The day for all those in love, St Valentine’s Day, has become not only a blessing for retail shops and marketers but also an opportunity for couples in love to take a trip or do something fun together or to show their affection in an unusual way. Guided tours of the Bojnice Castle were enriched on Valentine’s Day with a search for “symbols of love”.
Vote by February 29 for the European Tree of the Year
The European Tree of the Year competition for 2012 is now underway and a lime (Linden) tree from Lipany, the winner of the Slovak national contest, is ready to go up against some strong competition from its European neighbours.
People do not have to make this crisis their crisis
The legendary Dutch football player and coach Johan Cruyff once said: “Before I make a mistake, I don’t make it”. He meant that if one is prepared for a crisis and one has done everything to minimise any negative effects and secure one’s profits one will not be affected by that crisis. But how? It is easier than one might think.
The time of secret files
HARDLY a week passes without the Slovak public being thrown yet another secret file, surreptitious recording, testimony from a ‘trusted’ source, or merely just a bad joke as though citizens are being tested on how much of the dismal state of domestic politics they can stomach.
Making it easier to check on business partners
DURING these uncertain economic times when secondary insolvency can bring an otherwise healthy company to its knees, it is important to be able to review the financial health of potential or current business partners. This will be easier to do next year in Slovakia when a registry of financial statements will be made available to businesses. While the legislation establishing this registry was being debated, an amendment was proposed to also raise the threshold for mandatory independent audits of financial statements of Slovak companies, but this was rejected by parliament.The legislation enacted was a revision to the law on accounting prepared by the Finance Ministry and adopted by parliament on December 1.
Election campaign goes to the airwaves
THOUGH official campaigning before Slovakia’s March 10 parliamentary elections was supposed to have kicked off on February 18, the country was already flooded with billboards featuring politicians and their election slogans, while campaign teams roamed the country offering promises and excerpts from election programmes to potential voters.
Communicating online with the taxman
‘ELECTRONISATION’, a Slovak neologism meaning the switch from paper-based operations to a digital environment, has become a mantra in Slovakia, promising to make the life of ordinary citizens, businesspeople and the state administration better and easier. But the current reality in Slovakia has instead tended to support the saying that while a man can really complicate a situation, he can never do it as well as a computer.
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- Fico praises China and Vietnam as models, says liberal democracy has failed
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- The compass points to Kúty, and people are starting to follow
- News digest: Prosecutor seeks jail for NBS Governor Kažimír as his political support wanes
- Slovakia loses another EV model to Spain as Stellantis chooses Zaragoza over Trnava
- Slovak female triathlete shatters barriers with historic win at Himalayan event
- Weekend: Celebration of fun comes to Malacky Photo
- News digest: Fico’s bloc wants to save money by restricting electoral access
- Slovakia plans to restrict access to new medicines amid funding shortfall
- No more photos or bank statements? Slovakia moves to ease residence process
- Top 10 events in Bratislava for foreigners More articles ›
