LAHORE: There are global precedents for special taxes akin to Pakistan’s super tax on the wealthy or high-earning entities. The mechanisms differ but wealth taxes, surtaxes and solidarity levies revolve around the shared principles of fairness, efficiency, deterrence of tax avoidance and equitable burden sharing.
The recent ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) validating the super tax on entities earning over Rs500 million per year has thrust fundamental questions about fairness, justice and fiscal responsibility into the public arena. After over a decade of litigation, the FCC has now affirmed that companies which obtained stay orders against this levy must pay the accumulated tax -- an amount now estimated at Rs250-270 billion. The ruling vindicates the government’s authority to legislate taxation. Many business owners complain of hardship and threat to investment, yet others argue that leniency would be unjust to those who played by the rules and continued paying the super tax throughout the litigation.
France has been at the forefront of experimenting with special taxes on the wealthy. In 2025, its ‘differential contribution’ -- a surtax designed to ensure that individuals earning above 250 000 euros pay at least 20 per cent of income in tax -- raised only about 400 million euros, far less than the 1.9 billion euros initially projected.
In Norway, an annual wealth tax (formuesskatt) applies to individuals with net assets above certain thresholds. It raised over 32 billion kroner recently and remains a central feature of the political and fiscal landscape, particularly in debates around economic equality and redistribution.
Spain introduced a temporary “solidarity wealth tax” on net wealth exceeding 3 million euros to address fiscal strains; similarly, Colombia has adopted a wealth tax with rates between 0.5 per cent and 1.0 per cent on high-net-worth individuals, and Chile applies luxury levies on high-end assets. These experiments signal an international recognition that traditional income tax alone may not suffice in addressing modern inequalities.
In Pakistan, the super tax controversy has become emblematic of broader systemic issues: the efficacy of the tax administration, the role of judicial delays, and the balance between rule of law and equitable revenue collection. More than a decade of litigation meant that many high earners evaded paying the levy for years, not due to legislative repeal but due to repeated stays granted by lower courts. Now, with the court’s final judgment, these amounts are due -- retroactively -- imposing a fiscal burden that some argue is long overdue and legally justified.
Pakistan’s super tax -- introduced in 2015 and expanded over the years -- targets high earning entities with an additional levy on profits above a large threshold. The intention behind such levies is to ensure that the wealthiest contributors shoulder a fairer share of the tax burden, especially when ordinary taxpayers perceive inequity between statutory obligations and actual compliance.
Tax litigation -- especially where constitutional rights and statutory interpretation collide -- is naturally complex. But the duration of litigation in this case suggests a deeper malaise: institutional inertia, disproportionate use of judicial stays, and a lack of procedural timelines that encourage expedited resolutions. When justice takes more than a decade, it doesn’t just delay accountability -- it distorts economic incentives, deepens mistrust, and creates uneven burdens between compliant and non-compliant taxpayers.
In many advanced tax jurisdictions, courts enjoy discretion in granting stays, often requiring conditions such as security deposits, partial payments, or strict time limits to prevent revenue loss.
For Pakistan, upholding the super tax vindicates the principle that high earners have an obligation to contribute fairly. But the long delay in resolution exposes structural weaknesses in the system that demand urgent reform. The essential lesson for Pakistan is clear that justice delayed can undermine both trust and treasury so, reform must follow.
