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Since the turn of the current century, leading transnational organizations and academic scholarship have identified tax competition among countries as one of the scourges of the international tax regime. Both the EU and the OECD have warned that tax competition erodes the tax bases of Member States and impedes their ability to provide essential services. Commentators have argued that unrestrained competition is driving tax rates on mobile sources of income to (or close to) zero, a process that jeopardizes the very existence of the welfare state, exacerbates problems of global poverty, and deprives developing countries of funds that they desperately need in order to improve their physical infrastructure and human capital. Tax competition is also said to misallocate economic resources by driving investment to where the tax rate is lowest rather than to where the return on investment is highest.Most proposals for reform suggest that, to one extent or another, countries harmonize their tax policies with the aim of mitigating the threat of mutually harmful tax competition. One prevalent theme in reform proposals is that countries be prohibited from offering foreign investors a more lenient tax regime than that which applies to their own residents (“ring fencing”). The argument is that ring fencing is a predatory form of tax competition that allows foreign investors to benefit from government services for which they do not pay, erodes the tax base of other countries, and, by encouraging other countries to follow suit, instigates a “race to the bottom” to the detriment of all.This Article argues that, not only is international tax competition inevitable, but that free and fair tax competition, far from misallocating resources, is necessary in order to allocate resources efficiently and to maximize global welfare. It argues that limiting tax competition, particularly by restricting ring fencing, will likely exacerbate problems of global poverty and will lead to a more unequal distribution of wealth. Its thesis, therefore, is that tax reform should encourage, rather than discourage, international tax competition and that transnational organizations should focus their efforts on improving the competitive atmosphere.
This paper discusses the implications for tax systems of globalization of capital markets and of economies. It shows the extent to which particular taxes are affected by the globalization process. It speculates on future developments in this area and on tax competition.
Beginning with a primer on international taxation, this IEA monograph shows why the arguments used by governments to prevent tax competition are fallacious. It also outlines the threats to tax competition from the EU and OECD, and proposes ways in which the UK government should respond to those threats.
The increasing globalization of economic activity is bringing an awareness of the international consequences of tax policy. The move toward the common European market in 1992 raises the important question of how inefficiencies in the various tax systems—such as self-defeating tax competition among member nations—will be addressed. As barriers to trade and investment tumble, cross-national differences in tax structures may loom larger and create incentives for relocations of capital and labor; and efficient and equitable income tax systems are becoming more difficult to administer and enforce, particularly because of the growing importance of multinational enterprises. What will be the role of tax policy in this more integrated world economy? Assaf Razin and Joel Slemrod gathered experts from two traditionally distinct specialties, taxation and international economics, to lay the groundwork for understanding these issues, which will require the attention of scholars and policymakers for years to come. Contributors describe the basic provisions of the U.S. tax code with respect to international transactions, highlighting the changes contained in the U.S. Tax Reform Act of 1986; explore the ways that tax systems influence the decisions of multinationals; examine the effect of taxation on trade patterns and capital flows; and discuss the implications of the opening world economy for the design of optimal international tax policy. The papers will prove valuable not only to scholars and students, but to government economists and international tax lawyers as well.
This book presents 15 original papers and commentaries by a distinguished group of tax policy and tax administration experts. Using international examples, they highlight the state of knowledge of tax reform, present new thinking about the issue, and analyze useful policy options. The book’s general goal is to examine the current and emerging challenges facing tax reformers and to assess possible directions future reforms are likely to take. More specific themes include distributional issues, how to tax capital income, how to design specific taxes (e.g., the income tax, the value-added tax, the property tax), how to consider the politics and administrative aspects of tax reform, and how to combine the separate insights into comprehensive tax reform.
Rich people stash away trillions of dollars in tax havens like Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, or Singapore. Multinational corporations shift their profits to low-tax jurisdictions like Ireland or Panama to avoid paying tax. Recent stories in the media about Apple, Google, Starbucks, and Fiat are just the tip of the iceberg. There is hardly any multinational today that respects not just the letter but also the spirit of tax laws. All this becomes possible due to tax competition, with countries strategically designing fiscal policy to attract capital from abroad. The loopholes in national tax regimes that tax competition generates and exploits draw into question political economic life as we presently know it. They undermine the fiscal autonomy of political communities and contribute to rising inequalities in income and wealth. Building on a careful analysis of the ethical challenges raised by a world of tax competition, this book puts forward a normative and institutional framework to regulate the practice. In short, individuals and corporations should pay tax in the jurisdictions of which they are members, where this membership can come in degrees. Moreover, the strategic tax setting of states should be limited in important ways. An International Tax Organisation (ITO) should be created to enforce the principles of tax justice. The author defends this call for reform against two important objections. First, Dietsch refutes the suggestion that regulating tax competition is inefficient. Second, he argues that regulation of this sort, rather than representing a constraint on national sovereignty, in fact turns out to be a requirement of sovereignty in a global economy. The book closes with a series of reflections on the obligations that the beneficiaries of tax competition have towards the losers both prior to any institutional reform as well as in its aftermath.
This book explores one of the most dynamic and exciting aspects of globalization—international tax competition. With rising mobility and soaring capital flows, individuals and businesses are gaining freedom to work and invest in nations with lower tax rates. That freedom is pressuring governments to cut taxes on income, investment, and wealth. In Global Tax Revolution, Chris Edwards and Daniel Mitchell chronicle tax reforms around the world in recent decades. They describe the dramatic business tax cuts of Ireland, the flight of successful people from high-tax France, and the introduction of simple “flat taxes” in more than two dozen nations. Like other aspects of globalization, tax competition is generating intense political opposition. Numerous governments and international organizations are fighting to restrict tax cuts. Edwards and Mitchell challenge those efforts, arguing that tax competition is helping to advance prosperity, expand human rights, and rein in bloated governments.The authors argue that the U.S. economy can be revitalized by embracing competition and overhauling the federal tax code. They discuss how current tax rules suppress wages and investment and describe the tax changes needed for workers and businesses to succeed in the fast-paced global economy. Rather than idly complaining about jobs and capital moving offshore, this book argues that policymakers need to embrace major tax reforms to ensure rising standards of living for Americans in the years ahead.
This comprehensive book adopts a nuanced yet straightforward approach to analysing the complex phenomenon of international tax competition. Using the ongoing international efforts of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the European Union (EU) as a basis for its analysis, it explores the mixed effects of tax competition and offers an effective approach that takes account of the asymmetrical global context.
A growing empirical literature has documented significant profit shifting activities by multinationals. This paper looks at the impact of such profit shifting on real activity and tax competition. Real activity can be affected as profit shifting changes—and theoretically most likely reduces—the cost of capital. Tax competition, even over real capital, is affected, because a permissive attitude toward profit shifting can be seen as a selective tax reduction for multinationals. Tightening profit shifting rules in turn can affect tax competition through the main rate. This paper discusses these issues theoretically and with the help of a simulation to assess the impact of profit-shifting on investment, revenues, and government behavior. Using the theoretical framework, it also provides a brief overview of the related empirical literature.
Tax competition in the form of harmful tax practices can distort trade and investment patterns, erode national tax bases and shift part of the tax burden onto less mobile tax bases. The Report emphasises that governments must intensify their cooperative actions to curb harmful tax practices.