The National Federation of Associations of Self-Employed Workers, ATA, denounces the unbearable bureaucratic burden borne by more than 3,472,000 self-employed people in Spain. The data are compelling: a self-employed worker spends an average of 226 hours per year solely on dealing with various administrations and fulfilling their tax, labor, and Social Security obligations.
This time spent has risen in recent months due to uncertainty surrounding regulatory changes: the EU’s new Artificial Intelligence Regulation, changes in verifactu, time-tracking registration… “If in December we spoke of 200 hours per year, all this new bureaucracy has not come to reduce that figure. Quite the opposite. They don’t even let us balance our lives,” said Lorenzo Amor, president of ATA.
This dedication not only represents a loss of productive time but also has a direct economic impact. Considering a mean cost of 15 euros per hour, these 226 hours amount to €3,390 per self-employed person per year. On a global scale, bureaucracy and regulatory compliance cost the sector more than €11.0 billion per year (11.77 billion euros) and more than 780 million hours spent by self-employed people on handling bureaucratic tasks.
Weekly Commitment
In a sector where the average workweek is 47 hours, the self-employed devote at least four hours of their business week or their time off to dealing with the administration. Self-employed individuals report in ATA’s Barometer that bureaucratic obstacles are one of their principal burdens. For 40.7% of respondents, reducing bureaucracy is a top priority, suggesting, among other things, moving from the current model of four tax filings to two or even to a single annual filing. Not only does this entail an added cost, but it also dramatically undermines their ability to achieve work-life balance. Thus, the hours spent on bureaucracy by all self-employed workers amount to as much as the weekly work (47 hours on average) of 317,000 self-employed people.
This situation worsens for nearly a million self-employed people who employ workers. For them, the increase in administrative workload is exponential, since in addition to their personal self-employed tasks they must meet all the employment and regulatory obligations that employers face, which are increasingly complex and demanding.
“The bureaucracy is suffocating the sector. For years we’ve heard talk of administrative simplification and reducing burdens, but it never becomes a reality because regulatory compliance keeps growing,” says Lorenzo Amor, president of ATA. “More and more rules mean more procedures and more obligations. Spain cannot keep up at this pace. A radical change is needed because bureaucracy is choking and suffocating self-employed people.”
For all these reasons, the National Federation of Associations of Self-Employed Workers, ATA, warns that the current system is unsustainable. “Every day we devote more time to papers and less to creating wealth. Less work-life balance, less rest, and a higher economic cost. We cannot allow the administration to become an obstacle rather than a facilitator. Many people this summer, instead of resting, are reviewing papers and regulations to avoid scares and keep up with the dreaded paperwork,” concludes Lorenzo Amor.
