Larisa Petrovna Grundel, Nina Ilinishna Malis, Natalia Aleksandrovna Nazarova, Irina Aleksandrovna Zhuravleva
The tax system of the Russian Federation is guided by the principles of unity, mobility and stability, multiple forms of taxes, one-time taxation, equity and equality. However, criticisms of the existing tax systems are a common trend in many countries. They specifically concern inequitable and unstable tax laws, vague language used in them, tax illiteracy and poor tax discipline, lack of tax exemptions for certain categories of taxpayers; all these problems are frequently cited by tax system researchers in their papers. In the present study, the authors analyze the impact of the tax system’s peculiarities on the status of population inequality in the country. The current taxation system in the Russian Federation has emerged quite recently (over the past 20 years). The so-called flat tax scale applies in Russia, with a rate of 13% for all social strata. Currently, there is a significant stratification of the population in Russia in terms of the amount of income received. At the same time, the number of people with incomes below the subsistence minimum is growing, the middle-class segment is narrowing, and the level of wealth concentration is increasing. The purpose of the present article is to substantiate the use of progressive tax scale for solving the problem of social differentiation and social fairness as exemplified by some countries similar to Russia in terms of socio-economic indicators. The authors come to the conclusion that in order to increase the effectiveness of the tax management strategy, it is necessary to expedite a prompt adoption of a progressive individual income tax scale in Russia.