degressiivinenrasittava

Degressiivinen rasittava is a term used in Finnish policy analysis to describe a burden whose growth rate diminishes as the level of the underlying activity increases. In practice, it refers to a policy, regulation or cost that imposes a relatively larger load on small actors than on large ones, because fixed costs or administrative requirements are spread over a smaller base, while additional costs rise at a slower rate than the activity grows.

Etymology and usage: The adjective degressiivinen signals a decreasing marginal impact, while rasittava denotes burden or strain. The combination is not a standard, widely codified term in Finnish law, but it appears in discussions of taxation, regulation and administrative costs to characterize burdens that are not proportional to scale. It is often contrasted with progressive, regressive and proportional burdens to highlight how administrative and compliance costs interact with firm size or activity level.

Examples: A regulatory scheme that charges a fixed annual fee plus a small, size-dependent charge can be degressiivinen rasittava if the fixed portion dominates for small firms and the variable portion grows slowly with output. A licensing process that requires substantial one-time setup costs (which are sunk for larger operators) may also function as a degressiivinen rasittava burden, since the per-unit or per-output cost falls as scale increases.

Relation to other concepts: It is distinct from progressive taxation (where rates rise with base), and from regressive burdens (where relative costs fall with income). Degressiivinen rasittava emphasizes the diminishing marginal impact of a burden as activity expands, with policy implications for equity, incentives, and administrative efficiency.

See also: regulatory burden, administrative cost, tax design, proportional burden.