The Relationship Between MNE Tax Haven Use and FDI Into Developing Economies Characterized by Capital Flight
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HM Treasury's Review of the Isle of Man Customs And
Annex A: HM Treasury’s review of the Isle of Man Customs and Excise’s administration of VAT in relation to aircraft and yachts 1. Background 1.1 In Autumn 2017, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) released details from documents leaked from the law firm Appleby and its associates. Dubbed the ‘Paradise Papers’, these records later formed the basis of a number of media reports regarding tax authorities in offshore jurisdictions and the tax affairs of high-net worth individuals. In some cases, individuals named within the reports were alleged to have imported aircraft into the Isle of Man in order to benefit from its Value Added Tax (VAT) registration process. 1.2 Following this, the Isle of Man Government announced on 24 October 2017 that it had invited HM Treasury to conduct a review into the practice for the importation of aircraft into the EU through the Isle of Man. The Financial Secretary to the Treasury accepted this invitation on behalf of HM Treasury on 15 November 2017. Shortly after, HM Treasury and the Isle of Man Government agreed to expand the scope of the review to include the administration of VAT in relation to yachts in the Isle of Man. 1.3 This document summarises the findings and recommendations of HM Treasury’s review and addresses two key themes: • the effectiveness of processes and procedures used by Isle of Man Customs and Excise (IOMCE) with regards to the VAT treatment of aircraft and yacht importations; and • the effectiveness of domestic and European VAT legislation with regards to international transport. -
Net Zero by 2050 a Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector Net Zero by 2050
Net Zero by 2050 A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector Net Zero by 2050 A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector Net Zero by 2050 Interactive iea.li/nzeroadmap Net Zero by 2050 Data iea.li/nzedata INTERNATIONAL ENERGY AGENCY The IEA examines the IEA member IEA association full spectrum countries: countries: of energy issues including oil, gas and Australia Brazil coal supply and Austria China demand, renewable Belgium India energy technologies, Canada Indonesia electricity markets, Czech Republic Morocco energy efficiency, Denmark Singapore access to energy, Estonia South Africa demand side Finland Thailand management and France much more. Through Germany its work, the IEA Greece advocates policies Hungary that will enhance the Ireland reliability, affordability Italy and sustainability of Japan energy in its Korea 30 member Luxembourg countries, Mexico 8 association Netherlands countries and New Zealand beyond. Norway Poland Portugal Slovak Republic Spain Sweden Please note that this publication is subject to Switzerland specific restrictions that limit Turkey its use and distribution. The United Kingdom terms and conditions are available online at United States www.iea.org/t&c/ This publication and any The European map included herein are without prejudice to the Commission also status of or sovereignty over participates in the any territory, to the work of the IEA delimitation of international frontiers and boundaries and to the name of any territory, city or area. Source: IEA. All rights reserved. International Energy Agency Website: www.iea.org Foreword We are approaching a decisive moment for international efforts to tackle the climate crisis – a great challenge of our times. -
Is Panama Really Your Tax Haven? Secrecy Jurisdictions
Is Panama really your tax haven? Secrecy jurisdictions and the countries they harm Petr Janský, Markus Meinzer, Miroslav Palanský1 Abstract Secrecy jurisdictions provide services that enable the residents of other countries to escape the laws and regulations of their home economies, evade tax, or hide their legally or illegally obtained assets. Recent offshore leaks offer only a limited and biased view of the world of financial secrecy. In this paper we quantify which secrecy jurisdictions provide secrecy to which countries and assess how successful countries are in targeting these jurisdictions with their policies. To that objective we develop the Bilateral Financial Secrecy Index (BFSI) and estimate it for 86 countries by quantifying the financial secrecy supplied to them by up to 100 secrecy jurisdictions. We then evaluate two major recent policy efforts by comparing them with the results of the BFSI. First, we focus on the blacklisting process of the European Commission and find that most of the important secrecy jurisdictions for EU member states have been identified by the lists. Second, we link the results to data on active bilateral automatic information exchange treaties to assess how well- aimed are the policymakers’ limited resources. We argue that while low-secrecy jurisdictions’ gains are maximized if a large share of received secrecy is covered by automatic information exchange, tax havens aim not to activate these relationships with countries to which they supply secrecy. Our results show that so far, some major secrecy jurisdictions successfully keep their most prominent relationships uncovered by automatic information exchange, and activating these relationships may thus be an effective tool to curb secrecy. -
State Cigarette Excise Taxes: Implications for Revenue and Tax Evasion
May 2003 State Cigarette Excise Taxes: Implications for Revenue and Tax Evasion Final Report Prepared for Tobacco Technical Assistance Consortium Emory University, Rollins School of Public Health 1518 Clifton Road, NE Atlanta, GA 30322 Prepared by Matthew C. Farrelly Christian T. Nimsch Joshua James RTI International Health, Social, and Economics Research Research Triangle Park, NC 27709 RTI Project Number 08742.000 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY State cigarette excise taxes have long been used to raise revenue, curb smoking, and fund tobacco prevention and smoking cessation programs. Recently, there has been a dramatic increase in the average level of taxes and the number of states increasing their tax rates. To better inform the debate over excise tax increases and their impact on revenue and tax evasion, we examine the impact of tax increases on cigarette sales and revenue from recent state experiences. The following is a summary of the key findings: Z Increasing state cigarette tax rates reduces smoking levels, especially among youth. Z States that do not increase their tobacco tax rates lose tobacco tax revenue over time because of inflation and ongoing smoking declines. Z States that significantly increase their tobacco tax rates gain tobacco tax revenue, despite related consumption declines, tax avoidance, and smuggling. Z Although cigarette tax avoidance and smuggling increase somewhat after cigarette tax increases, they do not cause state revenues to decline but only reduce the size of the states’ revenue gains from the tax increases. Z Cigarette sales typically decline sharply immediately after a cigarette tax increase and then rise again to settle on a new sales level lower than the sales level before the increase. -
Transfer Pricing As a Vehicle in Corporate Tax Avoidance
The Journal of Applied Business Research – January/February 2017 Volume 33, Number 1 Transfer Pricing As A Vehicle In Corporate Tax Avoidance Joel Barker, Borough of Manhattan Community College, USA Kwadwo Asare, Bryant University, USA Sharon Brickman, Borough of Manhattan Community College, USA ABSTRACT Using transfer pricing, U.S. Corporations are able to transfer revenues to foreign affiliates with lower corporate tax rates. The Internal Revenue Code requires intercompany transactions to comply with the “Arm’s Length Principle” in order to prevent tax avoidance. We describe and use elaborate examples to explain how U.S. companies exploit flexibility in the tax code to employ transfer pricing and related tax reduction and avoidance methods. We discuss recent responses by regulatory bodies. Keywords: Transfer Pricing; Tax avoidance; Inversion; Tax Evasion; Arm’s Length Principle; R & D for Intangible Assets; Cost Sharing Agreements; Double Irish; Profit Shifting INTRODUCTION ver the last decade U.S. corporations have been increasing their use of Corporate Inversions. In an inversion, corporations move their domestic corporations to foreign jurisdictions in order to be eligible O for much lower corporate tax rates. Furthermore, inversions allow U.S. corporations that have accumulated billions of dollars overseas through transfer pricing to access those funds tax free. With an inversion a U.S. corporation becomes a foreign corporation and would not have to pay tax to the U.S. government to access the funds accumulated abroad as the funds no longer have to be repatriated to be spent. Corporations continue to avoid taxation through Transfer Pricing. This article explains transfer pricing and discusses some of the tax issues that transfer pricing pose including recommendations and proposed legislation to mitigate the practice. -
The Power of States and Business: Explaining
Ref. Ares(2017)5230581 - 26/10/2017 The power of states and business: Explaining transformative change in the fight against tax evasion and avoidance The Power of States and Business v2.0 19 September 2017 Document Details Work Package WP3 Lead Beneficiary University of Bamberg Deliverable ID D3.2 Date 05, 03, 2017 Submission 07, 28, 2017 Dissemination Level PU – Public / CO – Confidential / CI – Classified Information Version 1.0 Author(s) Lukas Hakelberg University of Bamberg Political Science [email protected] Acknowledgements The project “Combatting Fiscal Fraud and Empowering Regulators (COFFERS)” has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 727145. Document History Date Author Description 03-05-2017 Lukas Hakelberg First draft 19-09-2017 Lukas Hakelberg Second draft Page 2 of 52 The Power of States and Business v2.0 19 September 2017 Contents Document Details 2 Acknowledgements 2 Document History 2 Contents 3 Executive Summary 4 1. Introduction 5 2. Power in International Tax Policy 7 3. Post-Crisis Initiatives Against Tax Evasion and Avoidance 15 3.1 The Emergence of Multilateral AEI 16 3.1.1 Points of Departure: Savings Directive and Qualified Intermediary Program 16 3.1.2 Setting the Agenda: Left-of-Center Politicians and Major Tax Evasion Scandals 17 3.1.3 Towards New Rules: Legislative Initiatives in Europe and the US 20 3.1.4 The Role of Domestic Interest Groups: Tax Evaders and Financial Institutions 22 3.1.5 Reaching International Agreement: From Bilateral FATCA Deals to Multilateral AEI 25 3.2 Incremental Change in the Fight against Base Erosion and Profit Shifting 28 3.2.1 Points of Departure: Limiting Taxation at Source Through Transfer Pricing 28 3.2.2 Setting the Agenda: Starbuck’s and the Inclusion of Emerging Economies 30 3.2.3 Towards New Rules: The BEPS Report’s Ambiguous Recommendations 32 3.2.4 The Role of Interest Groups: In Defense of the Arm’s Length Principle 33 3.2.5 Reaching International Agreement? Ongoing EU-US Bargaining over BEPS 36 4. -
Tax Haven Networks and the Role of the Big 4 Accountancy Firms
-RXUQDORI:RUOG%XVLQHVV[[[ [[[[ [[[²[[[ Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of World Business journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jwb Tax haven networks and the role of the Big 4 accountancy firms Chris Jonesa,⁎, Yama Temouria,c, Alex Cobhamb a Economics & Strategy Group, Aston Business School, Aston University, Birmingham B4 7ET, UK b Tax Justice Network, Oxford, UK c Faculty of Business, University of Wollongong Dubai, UAE ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Keywords: This paper investigates the association between the Big 4 accountancy firms and the extent to which multi- Tax havens national enterprises build, manage and maintain their networks of tax haven subsidiaries. We extend inter- Varieties of capitalism nalisation theory and derive a number of hypotheses that are tested using count models on firm-level data. Our Corporate taxation key findings demonstrate that there is a strong correlation and causal link between the size of an MNE’s tax Poisson regression haven network and their use of the Big 4. We therefore argue that public policy related to the role of auditors can Big 4 accountancy firms have a significant impact on the tax avoidance behaviour of MNEs. 1. Introduction 2014 which has provided a number of clear insights. These documents showed that PwC assisted MNEs to obtain at least 548 legal but secret Given the impact that the recent financial crisis of 2008 has had on tax rulings in Luxembourg from 2002 to 2010. The rulings allowed the public finances of developed economies, the use of tax avoidance MNEs to channel hundreds of billions of dollars through Luxembourg, measures by multinational enterprises (MNEs) has come under in- arising from economic activities that took place in other jurisdictions creasing scrutiny from various governments and civil society organi- and with effective tax rates so low that they saved billions of dollars in sations across the world. -
Financial Transaction Tax and Economic Crisis: Is It Time for a Tax on International Transactions?
RDTI Atual 05 IBDT | INSTITUTO BRASILEIRO DE DIREITO TRIBUTÁRIO Revista Direito Tributário Internacional Atual e-ISSN 2595-7155 FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX AND ECONOMIC CRISIS: IS IT TIME FOR A TAX ON INTERNATIONAL TRANSACTIONS? IMPOSTO SOBRE TRANSAÇÕES FINANCEIRAS E CRISE ECONÔMICA: É CHEGADA A HORA DE UM IMPOSTO SOBRE TRANSAÇÕES INTERNACIONAIS? Pedro Adamy Professor da Escola de Direito da Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS). Doutorando em Direito na Universidade de Heidelberg, Alemanha. Mestre em Direito pela Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). E-mail: [email protected] Recebido em: 15-04-2019 Aprovado em: 04-06-2019 ABSTRACT This paper aims at the legal problems that arise concerning the introduction of a financial transaction tax. The article analyzes the impact, characteristics and challenges of a tax on international financial transactions and its relationship to economic crises. KEYWORDS: FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX, ECONOMIC CRISIS, INTERNATIONAL TAXATION, REGULATORY MEASURES RESUMO Este artigo visa os problemas jurídicos que surgem com a introdução de um imposto sobre transações financeiras. O artigo analisa o impacto, as características e os desafios de um imposto sobre transações financeiras internacionais e sua relação com crises econômicas. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: IMPOSTO SOBRE TRANSAÇÕES FINANCEIRAS, CRISES ECONÔMICAS, TRIBUTAÇÃO INTERNACIONAL, MEDIDAS ADMINISTRATIVAS 157 Revista Direito Tributário Internacional Atual nº 05 p.157-171 - 2019 RDTI Atual 05 IBDT | INSTITUTO BRASILEIRO DE DIREITO TRIBUTÁRIO Revista Direito Tributário Internacional Atual e-ISSN 2595-7155 1. INTRODUCTORY REMARKS “Crisis is not the best advisor on formulating rules for normal times.”1 In the event of a financial crisis two phenomena will certainly occur: first, money will flow from unstable and poorer countries into more stable and richer ones; second, the discussion about a financial transaction tax (henceforth FTT) will be revived and gain attention among the press, economists, tax law professionals and oppositional politicians2. -
Tax Competition and Tax Coordination in the European Union: a Survey
A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics Keuschnigg, Christian; Loretz, Simon; Winner, Hannes Working Paper Tax competition and tax coordination in the European Union: A survey Working Papers in Economics and Finance, No. 2014-04 Provided in Cooperation with: Department of Social Sciences and Economics, University of Salzburg Suggested Citation: Keuschnigg, Christian; Loretz, Simon; Winner, Hannes (2014) : Tax competition and tax coordination in the European Union: A survey, Working Papers in Economics and Finance, No. 2014-04, University of Salzburg, Department of Social Sciences and Economics, Salzburg This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/122170 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle You are not to copy documents for public or commercial Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. www.econstor.eu TAX COMPETITION AND TAX COORDINATION IN THE EUROPEAN UNION: A SURVEY CHRISTIAN KEUSCHNIGG, SIMON LORETZ AND HANNES WINNER WORKING PAPER NO. -
Narrative Report on Ireland
Financial Secrecy Index Ireland Narrative Report on Ireland Ireland is ranked at 47th position on the 2013 Financial Secrecy Index. This ranking is based on a combination of its Chart 1 - How Secretive? Moderately secrecy score and a scale weighting based on its share of the secretive 31-40 global market for offshore financial services. 41-50 Ireland has been assessed with 37 secrecy points out of a 51-60 potential 100, which places it into the moderately secretive 61-70 category at the bottom of the secrecy scale (see chart 1). 71-80 Ireland accounts for over 2 per cent of the global market for 81-90 offshore financial services, making it a small player compared with other secrecy jurisdictions (see chart 2). Exceptionally secretive 91-100 Part 1: Telling the story1 Chart 2 - How Big? Ireland as a financial centre: history and background Overview huge Ireland’s role as a secrecy jurisdiction or tax haven is based on two broad developments. The first, dating from 1956, is a regime of low tax rates and tax loopholes that have large encouraged transnational businesses to relocate – often small only on paper – to Ireland. The second is the role of the tiny Dublin-based International Financial Services Centre (IFSC), a Wild-West, deregulated financial zone set up in 1987 under the corrupt Irish politician Charles Haughey, which has striven particularly to host international ‘shadow banking’ activity2. Ireland’s secrecy score of 37 makes it one of the least secretive jurisdictions on our index: secrecy was never a central part of its ‘offshore’ offering. -
Fixing U.S. International Taxation
DANIEL N. SHAVIRO FIXING U.S. INTERNATIONAL TAXATION 2 FIXING U.S. INTERNATIONAL TAXATION (forthcoming Oxford University Press, 2014) Daniel N. Shaviro June 2013 All Rights Reserved 2 1. INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW A Fork in the Road? Yogi Berra once offered the advice, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” He could almost have been speaking about the U.S. international tax rules, which govern how we tax cross-border or multinational investment. For “outbound” investment, or that earned abroad by U.S. companies, the U.S. rules, for almost a century, have muddled along in the netherworld between two sharply etched approaches that dominate the literature, each intuitively appealing but utterly inconsistent with the other. The first approach is called worldwide or residence-based taxation. Under it, the U.S. would impose tax at the same rate on U.S. companies’ foreign source income (FSI) as on their domestic income. The great apparent virtue of this approach is that it would prevent the companies from reducing their U.S. tax liability by investing (or reporting income) abroad rather than at home. The second approach is called source-based or territorial taxation. Under it, the U.S., recognizing that foreign companies pay no U.S. tax when they invest abroad, would extend this same U.S. tax exemption for FSI to its own companies. (This approach is therefore also called exemption). The great apparent virtue of this approach is that it would avoid placing U.S. companies under a competitive disadvantage, as compared to their foreign rivals, when they invest abroad. -
EMERGING ISSUES in INTERNATIONAL TAXATION – CHALLENGES and WAY FORWARD by PATIENCE T
EMERGING ISSUES IN INTERNATIONAL TAXATION – CHALLENGES AND WAY FORWARD By PATIENCE T. RUBAGUMYA COMMISSIONER LEGAL SERVICES AND BOARD AFFAIRS OUTLINE L 1 Introduction 2 Challenges in international taxation taxation 3 Proposed Way forward 4 Conclusion INTRODUCTION Structure of Budget Financing in Uganda and most African Countries: • Reliance on taxes to fund current and development expenditure • About 70% of the taxes are collected from domestic resources • Domestic resource mobilization is therefore key for sustainable development and thus the focus is now on international taxation and implementing strategies to enhance compliance with Transfer Pricing Regulations, Preventing Treaty Abuse and Policy redesign CHALLENGES Treaty Abuse: • This is a realistic challenge. Most treaties in developing countries are being abused due to inadequacy of the beneficial ownership anti provision. • Treaties are vulnerable to abuse and this is as a result of the way the provisions in those treaties are structured and as such the vice of treaty shopping is prevalent. CHALLENGES • Lack of information about worldwide activities and operations of multinational entities and finding comparable data for transfer pricing cases. • The MNEs create cash boxes in preferential tax regimes jurisdictions and these erode the tax base of developing countries through the payments of royalties and interest without substantial presence and value creation in such jurisdictions. CHALLENGES • Inadequate capacity of staff International taxation is complex, takes about four years to build expertise of tax official in international taxation matters. • Limited financing for capacity building programmes in the face of competing demands for resources which thus undermines domestic resource mobilization efforts. CHALLENGES- EXTRACTIVES • Some developing countries have significant oil reserves and other natural resources and often the right to tax income from the activities relating to exploitation of such resources is often an area of disputes that end up in costly international arbitration cases.