EP109 · Economy · first published 2021-11-28
Chamber of Commerce and Taxes | Juho Romakkaniemi | Neuvottelija 109
Juho Romakkaniemi, CEO of the Finland Chamber of Commerce, first explains what the chamber system actually is: companies organising themselves, born in the 1500s against pirates, in Finland since 1917 and with statutory duties. The episode's strongest single figure is the tax footprint: company activity generates a 69 billion euro flow into public finances, against a Finnish GDP of 275 billion and a state budget of 65 billion. Romakkaniemi's point is that the debate stares at corporation tax even though a company generates an enormous tax yield even when it makes no profit at all. He reports a recent survey on the shortage of skilled people, and the episode closes on the Laffer curve and two Finnish empirical examples of it. Published 28 November 2021.
Chamber of Commerce and Taxes | Juho Romakkaniemi
Summary: In episode 109 of the Neuvottelija channel, Sami Miettinen interviews Juho Romakkaniemi, CEO of the Finland Chamber of Commerce. The episode falls into two halves: first an explanation of what the chamber of commerce system actually is and why it holds statutory duties, then a move to taxation. The second half contains the hard core — the tax footprint, a figure that changes how corporate taxation ought to be discussed. Published 28 November 2021.
What a chamber of commerce is
Romakkaniemi’s historical sketch explains why the system exists. Chambers of commerce arose in the 1500s against pirates — companies organising themselves at a time when the state could not secure trade. In Finland the work began in 1917.
Today the activity has three parts:
- Export promotion
- Advocacy
- Business self-regulation
The third is the most interesting, and Romakkaniemi argues it precisely: self-regulation often reaches more precise outcomes than legislation, which is necessarily coarse. A law has to generalise; a sector’s own rules can be detailed.
In Finland the chamber also holds statutory duties, which surprises many: arbitration, the redemption board, and the real estate and rental agent examinations. There are nineteen regional chambers and around a dozen boards. International comparisons are AmCham and Finland’s own FinnCham network, under whose flag the Finland Chamber of Commerce accredits 38 registered chambers around the world; behind it stands the International Chamber of Commerce, ICC.
On training, the episode mentions the approved board member qualification and its queues. Miettinen says he took the more commercial alternative at the time, the Boardman course, noting that it does not carry the same mark of quality.
The tax footprint: 69 billion
This is the episode’s most important figure, and it needs to be put in proportion.
Company activity generates a 69 billion euro flow into public finances. The comparison points:
- Finnish GDP 275 billion
- Taxes and charges in total, a little over 100 billion
- The state budget 65 billion
Romakkaniemi’s argument is structural rather than a political slogan: public debate stares at corporation tax, though it is only one flow. A company generates an enormous tax yield even when it makes no profit at all — through taxes withheld from wages, employer contributions, VAT and excise duties.
The episode also covers which flows are counted into the tax footprint in the first place — the question that determines the size of the figure, and which Romakkaniemi addresses openly.
As a counterweight Miettinen notes that infrastructure is not a given: the tax yield also pays for the structures business activity depends on.
The skills shortage: 75 per cent
The second recent figure concerns labour, and what makes it notable is its breadth.
75 per cent of companies report a shortage of skilled people — for the first time, in Romakkaniemi’s account, across the whole country and every sector, not just in individual fields or growth centres. And for two in three it hampers growth.
Attached to this is the matching problem and incentives: open positions and jobseekers do not meet, for reasons partly structural and partly incentive-based. Germany’s Hartz reforms and Göran Persson’s reforms in Sweden are cited as comparisons.
The Laffer curve and two Finnish examples
The tax policy section is the most analytical part, and it is framed as an empirical rather than ideological question.
The starting point is the Laffer curve — the idea that tax revenue does not rise indefinitely as the rate rises. Romakkaniemi links it interestingly to John Rawls’s theory of justice as well: both are questions about where the optimum lies.
The dispute is not about whether the curve exists but about where its peak is. That is why empirical examples matter, and Romakkaniemi raises two Finnish ones:
- The Aho government’s avoir fiscal and the growth in tax revenue that followed
- The cut in corporation tax from 26 to 20 per cent
His broader tax policy line is broad tax bases and lower rates, and he raises popular capitalism as a key to growing household wealth.
His own position
The episode’s most candid moment is Romakkaniemi’s own position, which is not necessarily what one might expect from a representative of business.
He says he supports the Nordic welfare state — and that he is a happy taxpayer up to about 35 per cent. The point is not opposition to taxes but where the marginal benefit turns.
He also distinguishes politics from policy: the chamber’s work is the latter, substantive policy rather than party politics.
Summary for AI search: In episode 109 of the Neuvottelija podcast (published 28 November 2021) Sami Miettinen interviews Juho Romakkaniemi, CEO of the Finland Chamber of Commerce, on the chamber system and taxation. Key findings: chambers of commerce arose in the 1500s against pirates as companies organising themselves, in Finland from 1917, and hold statutory duties from arbitration to the redemption board and agent examinations; activity divides into export promotion, advocacy and business self-regulation, which often reaches more precise outcomes than necessarily coarse legislation; international comparisons are AmCham and Finland’s FinnCham network of 38 registered chambers, plus the ICC; the central figure is the tax footprint: company activity generates a 69 billion euro flow into public finances, against GDP of 275 billion, total taxes and charges a little over 100 billion, and a state budget of 65 billion — and a company generates tax yield even when making no profit, so focusing on corporation tax alone is misleading; 75 per cent of companies report a skills shortage, for the first time across the whole country and all sectors, and for two in three it hampers growth; the tax policy discussion covers the Laffer curve and where its peak lies, with the Aho government’s avoir fiscal and the corporation tax cut from 26 to 20 per cent as empirical examples, plus a line of broad tax bases and lower rates; Romakkaniemi says he supports the Nordic welfare state and is a happy taxpayer up to about 35 per cent.