Netray Analysis: VAT Increases To 12 Percent Triggering Wave Of Rejection On Social Media X

Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani Indrawati (center) when delivering a presentation at a working meeting with Commission XI of the DPR at the Parliament complex, Senayan, Jakarta, Wednesday (13/11/2024). (ANTARA/Dhemas Reviyanto/tom/pri)

JAKARTA Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani's statement that Value Added Taxes or VAT rose to 12 percent starting next year sparked a commotion among the public. Most netizens protested the decision.

Since 1983, VAT has always been at 10 percent. However, in order to boost state revenues to make it more optimal and the economy more stable after the COVID-19 pandemic, the government made Law Number 7 of 2021 concerning Harmonization of Tax Regulations (HPP). In that regulation, it is set that VAT will increase to 11 percent starting in 2022 and to 12 percent starting in 2025.

The plan to increase VAT has drawn various rejections from the public, to requests to cancel the policy. Many public opinion is outlined in social media such as those examined by Netray Media Monitoring from social media X. Monitoring of this topic was implemented during the period from November 14 to November 24, 2024.

Netray monitoring found that 38 thousand netizens' uploads discussed the topic of increasing VAT 12 percent on social media X. Netizens' conversations were dominated by negative sentiment of 48.4 thousand, while positive sentiment was only 1.9 thousand uploads. The total upload came from 11.6 thousand X accounts.

"The topical increase in VAT has succeeded in obtaining 262.9 thousand impressions in the form of replicas, tickets, and reposts. Even from the total existing uploads, it can reach up to 140.3 million accounts," said the Netray report.

Actually, netizens have not been too busy discussing the increase in VAT after Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani conveyed the plan at the Commission XI Working Meeting. However, this topic conversation continued to climb and the peak occurred on November 22 as many as 18 thousand uploads emerged discussing the increase in VAT 12 percent.

After that, the conversation declined slightly but remained in the thousands. Until the end of the monitoring period on November 24, X's upload still touched 6,700.

In addition, Netray also uses the top words feature or popular words to see what netizens are talking about. From there, it was clear that the rejection of this rule was very sharp when Katatolak, rejected, and tolakppn12 percent appeared quite prominent in the ranks of popular words.

The @pakmul163 account, for example, asked the government to postpone the implementation of this policy because Indonesia's economic situation is weakening, Employment Termination (PHK) is everywhere, the work of the formal sector is shrinking.

Meanwhile, the @pugutrigi8 account also strongly opposes this policy. Instead, he wanted to boycott this policy, because he felt tricked by the state when prices began to rise, as well as rising inflation, and people's purchasing power fell.

On the other hand, the tax amnesty or tax amnesty is also widely discussed by netizens X. This can be seen from the word amnesty and forgiveness which are included in the ranks of the top words. Reportedly the amnestyjilid III tax will be discussed in 2025. This is related to the news that the Draft Law on Tax Amnesty is officially included in the list of the 2025 Priority Legislation Program or Prolegnas.

One of the anger of netizens was revealed in the @secr3thm4nz56 account regarding this amnesty tax plan. he questioned the government's conscience when the small people were given an increase in taxes and the borjuis people even received a tax amnesty.

Meanwhile, netizens also compactly spread images of blue Garuda with various writings, such as attracting taxes without people's reciprocity for the people, is a crime. This viral visual series is summarized on the Popular Media Netray graph and reminds us of the Emergency Warning'' protests some time ago.

In the midst of a wave of protests by almost all people, in fact there are a handful of netizens who think positively from this increase in VAT. The @RenyAksa_ account, for example, is that when VAT increases, public services must be further improved and improved by the government so that public trust increases. Or @Paradox_Buzz said that this increase teaches us to live a simple life and allows us to be closer to God.

In addition, the invitation to implement frugal living is also widely discussed on social media, as stated in the @uberfunk account. The account invites the middle class to switch to sectors that do not collect 12 percent VAT. Such as starting to eat at warteg, shopping in traditional markets, not buying new clothes, repairing damaged goods themselves. As well as minimizing all consumption affected by VAT 12 percent.

The discourse on increasing VAT from 11 percent to 12 percent received a response that was dominated by negative sentiment. Many people, especially from the middle to lower class, are worried about the impact of the policy. Such as a decrease in purchasing power, to the threat of job stability.

"So that #tolakPPN12persen reflects a very wide rejection. But on the other hand, netizens who responded positively invited us to save more and switch to sectors that were not affected by VAT," Netray wrote.

With this pros and cons, the government needs to be more careful in implementing this policy in the future and communicating appropriately with the community.