The 2025 tax filings show growth - and significant growth at that. On profit tax, the tax base and the calculated tax rose 14 percent compared to 2024, while the net tax effect jumped a full 33 percent. At first glance, news that sounds like good economic news.

The numbers are concrete. 5.805 billion denars remained owed under profit tax, while refunds came to 323 million denars. Filings were submitted by 25,506 taxpayers - slightly more than the 25,051 the year before. According to the explanation, the rise comes from bigger company profits and less use of tax breaks.

But this is worth pausing on before celebrating. A bigger profit tax means bigger declared profits - and that's not automatically a sign that citizens are better off. Companies can post record profits in a year when the average citizen feels their money is worth less and less. A fuller treasury and a rising standard of living are not the same thing.

So the question that remains isn't how much more the state collected, but where that money ends up. When the tax effect rises by a third, the citizen rightly asks: will I see it in better roads, hospitals and schools, or only in better statistics in some report that nobody but the accountants will ever read?