El Salvador
National Level
Gobierno Central
Intermediate/Regional Level
Departamentos 14
Local Level
Municipios 262
National Urban Policy
- National urban policy type:Partial - Housing and Habitat PolicyPolicy temporality:Long-term
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El Salvador is a unitary republic. Its Political Constitution encouraged the decentralization process, naming municipalities as technically, economically and administratively autonomous governments. Municipal authorities have the power to regulate their own taxes. The Departments are only administrative and deconcentrated divisions that represent the central government.
The main municipal revenues are made up of transfers from the central government representing up to half of the local revenues, which still indicates a high dependency, followed by fees, licenses and local taxes. Among local taxes, the most important is property tax, followed by sales tax.