Tax Reform Plan

Colombia on Tuesday adopted a tax reform plan that was at the root of violent anti-government protests that left more than 60 people dead this year, but was eventually reconfigured to be kinder to the middle class and the poor. President Iván Duque signed the so-called "social investment law," which has as its stated objective to combat poverty in a country hit hard by the coronavirus epidemic. He says the law will, quote, "benefit nearly 29 million Colombians in a vulnerable situation" out of a total population of some 50 million. A first version of the law presented by Duque early this year to combat the economic consequences of the global health crisis would have significantly increased taxes on an already battered middle class.