Austerity is not business friendly, as thousands of Greek business owners can attest.

Faced with a 29 per cent tax rate, in a bid to stay afloat many are choosing to relocate to countries with lower taxes such as Bulgaria where the rate is just 10 per cent, reports The Advertiser.

Since 2010, when the number of registered Greek businesses was just 2,000, the figure has risen significantly to 17,000. This year alone, 3,642 Greek businesses were registered.

But Bulgaria is not complaining in the slightest, embracing their new visitors with signs in the Greek language just a 5 km drive over the border, including one which reads ‘Land of Opportunities’.

Prokopis Makris is one of these entrepreneurs. A qualified accountant, in Greece he owned a furniture company that was quickly failing. Without many other options, he made the move three years ago, and now comfortably runs a business out of a stunning office overlooking the town square of Petritsi, close to the border of northern Greece, from which he assists other business owners to make their own move to Bulgaria.

“We are bombarded with taxes in Greece; businesses are being annihilated,” Mr Makris said.

Yiorgos Kalaitzoglou also made the move three years ago, leaving his family an hour’s drive away in Thessaloniki.

He says the registration process took him just a few days, and now he makes €50,000 a year after paying 10 per cent in corporate tax, a five per cent tax on dividends and €100 a month in pension contributions.

“There are dozens of Greek businesses just in this area alone, from transport companies to textile businesses and construction materials,” Mr Kalaitzoglou said.

“The taxman in Greece takes 70 to 90 per cent of earnings, Greece simply doesn’t let you live.”

The 50-year-old says that though 80 per cent of the goods are imported from other European states, the majority are exported to his customers in Greece.

While this may be helping the individual Greek in the short-term, it is helping other economies and doing zero to help Greece out of its current financial predicament.

According to figures from Greece’s embassy in Sofia, from 2014 Greek owned businesses have been generating a whopping €5 billion each year, employing around 53,000 people.

However, authorities are uncertain as to whether the number of registered Greek businesses is in fact reflective of businesses that have physically relocated, or whether it is merely a change of address.

“Many Greek businesses in neighbouring countries may actually be most economically active in Greece,” Head of Greece’s Public Revenues Agency, George Pitsillis said, which he explains could soon see them in the unpleasant position of paying tax in both countries, along with fines.

To assist with the auditing process, Bulgarian authorities have said they will fully cooperate with Greece and share the required tax details.

Meanwhile, president of the Greek Federation of Tax Advisers, Vassilis Kampanis is adamant the only way to bring business back to Greece is to make tax cuts and have a simpler system in place for those seeking to establish themselves in Greece.

Realistically this seems unlikely to happen any time soon however, given Greece has agreed to more tax and pension reforms under a third bailout loan.