The refusal of the Ministry of Finance to adjust the state personal income tax rate to the evolution of inflation and salaries continues to have effects on taxpayers’ pockets, although uneven depending on the level of income. In practice, the decision implies that, although citizens have seen their salaries increased in recent years to compensate for the rising cost of living, this nominal increase does not translate into a real improvement in their purchasing power, but rather into a greater tax burden. The result is that in 2026 taxpayers will pay between 250 and 2,160 additional euros in personal income tax – in the declaration produced next year.
This phenomenon, known as cold progressivity, occurs when the tax brackets and personal and family minimums that are exempt from taxation remain frozen while prices and salaries rise. By not updating these key elements of the tax, many taxpayers begin to pay taxes in higher brackets. The Treasury argues that the tax, due to the scale of the tax, benefits wealthy taxpayers more. And he defends that the reductions approved in recent years by the Government represent a greater relief than those approximately 250 euros that would be saved each year if the adjustment of the sections had occurred with which prices have increased.
According to calculations made by the Registry of Tax Advisory Economists (REAF), the specialized tax body of the General Council of Economists, a taxpayer with an annual income of 25,000 euros will pay around 250 euros more than what would correspond if the state rate were updated according to inflation. In the case of incomes of 30,000 euros, the extra cost is around 350 euros, while for incomes of 45,000 euros the increase is around 500 euros. As the income level increases, the difference widens: those who earn 70,000 euros per year pay around 760 additional euros, and at the highest levels, with an income of 400,000 euros, the excess exceeds 2,100 euros. In all cases, the amounts vary slightly between communities, since the territories apply different rates in the regional rate.
The REAF has been estimating the state personal income tax rate for years. Until now, its calculations were based on the evolution of the consumer price index (CPI). However, on this occasion the organization has refined the methodology by incorporating the average salary variation collected in the Statistics of Collective Agreements of the Ministry of Labor, which reflects a cumulative increase of 18.1% between 2022 and 2026. To this it also adds the effect of not having updated either the personal minimum or the 2,000 euros corresponding to the concept of other deductible expenses, taking as a reference the CPI based on 2025, which records an increase of 15.8%.
The direct consequence of cold progressivity has been a notable increase in tax collection. As salaries rise in nominal terms and the tax is not adjusted, the Treasury takes in more without the need to approve explicit increases. In fact, part of the collection record recorded in recent years, the last in 2025, is explained by this phenomenon.
Added to this scenario is a relevant change at the community level, and that is that the personal income tax deflation has almost definitively disappeared from the regional map. During the most intense years of the , most territories adapted the tax rate to the evolution of prices. However, that approach has completely changed. In 2025, with the CPI in the correction phase, the communities put an end to that formula. Now, in 2026, according to the latest data collected by REAF, the territories appear to have consolidated the trend.
Not even in the PP communities
The tax advisors presented this Tuesday their traditional Panorama of regional and regional taxationa document that is 25 years old and that includes all the tax changes approved by the communities for the current year. Rubén Gimeno, technical secretary of the REAF, remembers that other years, especially between 2022 and 2024, the autonomies reduced their tax rate. They did so either through deflation, or by lowering rates to certain thresholds or by increasing personal and family minimums, and always with the aim of counteracting the effects of inflation. In 2026, however, only La Rioja introduces a clause in its regulations that contemplates something similar.
According to Gimeno, the tax scale and the personal and family minimums of La Rioja will be subject to deflation when the interannual variation rate of the regional CPI for the month of December is greater than 3%. That is, the amounts of the sections of the general taxable base and the personal and family minimums will only be updated if that percentage is exceeded. In the rest of the territories, at least for now, there are no approved modifications.
The communities’ decision to have put an end to this formula coexists with a political debate that remains open. The Popular Party, which governs most of the autonomies, maintains pressure on the Treasury to deflate the personal income tax – in this case the state rate -, a measure that the Government has repeatedly rejected year after year, considering that it benefits people with the highest income to a greater extent. However, for the second consecutive year, their communities choose not to replicate the measure that the party demands from the Executive.
