Excise Tax Fiscal Efficiency as a Component of Optimizing the Indirect Taxation System

The excise taxes contain a hidden reserve for raising funds for the state budget. Therefore, in the case of ensuring their high fiscal efficiency, they can serve as a significant resource for filling the revenue side of the country's budget. The purpose of the article is to analyze the dynamics and structure of excise tax receipts to the State Budget of Ukraine, to determine the main indicators that can be used to assess the fiscal efficiency of the excise tax. The information base for the study was the official data of the State Statistics Service of Ukraine, reports of the State Treasury Service on the implementation of the State budget, data from the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry of Ukraine. The analysis of the structure and dynamics of the excise tax transferred to the state budget for the period 2014-2019 was carried out. Indicators that characterize the fiscal significance of the excise tax as part of the state budget revenues were determined. The tendencies revealed by the author of a decrease in the fiscal significance of the excise tax are, first of all, a consequence of the insufficient efficiency of administration of this tax, which follows from the imperfection of the current legislation and the ignorance of some potential sources of excise taxation. Based on the data of the State Fiscal Service and the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry of Ukraine on the production of thermal coal in the period 2017-2019, an assessment of the potentially lost revenues of the state budget was made. These revenues would become possible with the introduction of an excise tax on thermal coal. In the context of optimizing the system of indirect taxation, it was determined that an increase in the current rates of excise tax on excisable goods will not give a tangible effect in the medium term, but will lead to an increase in the level of “shadow” (illegal) production, sale and movement of excisable goods across the customs border of Ukraine. Therefore, the legislature should pay attention to those groups of goods that are in a state monopoly, and their taxation can give significant additional funds to the state budget.