In this paper the authors deal with the tax reliefs provided for residential property occupied by the payers of the property tax. The authors will try to answer whether and what type of tax reliefs are given to this category of property in comparative tax law. The special attention will be devoted to the critical analysis of tax credits provided for residential property in Serbian tax law.

The paper analyzes the tax relief for employment of new residents. In the first two parts, there is a legal analysis of Art. 15c of the Law on Personal Income Tax and Art. 15a of the Law on Contributions for Mandatory Social Insurance. Then, this tax relief will be examined in the context of the principles of tax law and public finance, especially the principle of tax fairness, the principle of tax efficiency and the principle of the stability of the tax system. The conclusion is that the problem of the outflow of highly skilled workers could not be solved by partial reforms of tax laws. A systematic solution implies a radical reform of the personal income tax, which would be firmly based on the principles of tax law and tax science.