A guest blog by Sol Picciotto, co-ordinator of the BEPS Monitoring Group. What will BEPS fix, and who will gain? The launch this week of the final reports from the G20/OECD project on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) has sparked two frequently asked questions. The first is: can we give … [Read more...]
Taxing corporations
Finance Uncovered: how Africa’s biggest cell phone firm shifts billions offshore
From Finance Uncovered, a TJN-founded project, a press release about a story that is (among other things) front page of South Africa's influential Mail & Guardian newspaper. Finance Uncovered reveals how Africa’s biggest cell phone firm shifts billions offshore The Finance Uncovered global … [Read more...]
New study: U.S. Fortune 500 cos have $2.1 trillion offshore
From Citizens for Tax justice, via email: "Today Citizens for Tax Justice and the U.S. PIRG Education Fund released, "Offshore Shell Games," a new study which found that nearly three-quarters of Fortune 500 companies maintained at least one tax haven subsidiary in 2014, with just 30 companies … [Read more...]
GATJ: OECD tweaks to tax rules for multinational corporations fall short on transparency, inclusivity
From the Global Alliance for Tax Justice, a press release on the OECD's BEPS process, which we wrote about yesterday: "The Global Alliance for Tax Justice (GATJ) is urgently calling for a United Nations-based follow-up process to the “flawed” OECD Base Erosion and Profit Shifting project, in … [Read more...]
Press release: OECD’s BEPS proposals will not be the end of tax avoidance by multinationals
PRESS RELEASE EMBARGOED: 14:00 CET See this press release in pdf form here. See the BEPS Monitoring Group's longer technical evaluation here (or in condensed form here.) See links to further statements by others below. OECD’s BEPS proposals will not be the end of tax avoidance by … [Read more...]
How ‘competitive’ tax and incentive policies hurt small U.S. businesses
Cross-posted from the Fools' Gold site: Recently we have written about how supposedly 'competitive' national policies on tax and the financial sector in Britain tend to favour large multinational firms over smaller, more locally-based ones, and how they also tend to lead to less competition in … [Read more...]
Developing countries and BEPS: an equal footing?
From Bloomberg BNA: "Since 2013, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD] has been working on a 15-item BEPS action plan under Group of 20 authority with the aim of closing “loopholes” that allow multinationals to drastically reduce their taxes. Along the way, the project … [Read more...]
The march of the international tax treaty arbitrators
From Martin Hearson, a (somewhat wonkish) post about tax treaties and developing countries, entitled The tax treaty arbitrators cometh: "There are lots of reasons why eliminating all forms of double taxation faced by cross-border investors is a sensible thing to try to do. It is what tax treaties … [Read more...]
The G20/OECD BEPS Project on corporate tax: a scorecard
In 2013 the G20 world leaders mandated the OECD, a club of rich countries, for its Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project to produce reforms of international tax rules that would ensure that multinational enterprises could be taxed ‘where economic activities take place and where value is … [Read more...]
C20: new civil society policy paper on tax justice
Adapted from the Global Alliance for Tax Justice. Organisations from 91 countries from around the world, representing close to 500 civil society organisations and almost 5,000 individuals, have been working together for the last 18 months via the Civil 20 (C20) to engage with G20 governments on … [Read more...]
Tracking corporate tax breaks: a welcome new form of transparency emerges in the U.S.
Cross-posted with Fools' Gold: Across the world, corporations are showered with tax breaks and other inducements in the name of 'competitiveness.' In most cases these tax breaks don't affect investment decisions in any way. They are pure giveaways. In many countries it's been hard to track the … [Read more...]
Joseph Stiglitz: Why America (and Britain come to that) are on the wrong side of history
Influential economist Joseph Stiglitz has published an article in the Guardian newspaper in which he argues that the USA (and we would add the UK and other major OECD countries) is systematically blocking attempts by other countries to strengthen global governance. … [Read more...]
Quote of the day – Africa hit by global tax intrigues
Here's our quote of the day, via the Financial Transparency Coalition: “African nations are at the epicenter of the crisis of illicit financial flows, yet they are not even in the room when decisions are being made,” said Alvin Mosioma, Executive Director of the Tax Justice Network Africa. “A … [Read more...]
Did NGOs invent a pot of gold? (No.)
By Alex Cobham, our research director: first posted at Uncounted. A draft paper by Maya Forstater, circulated by the Center for Global Development in time for the Financing for Development conference in Addis, attacks the integrity of many people and NGOs working on tax justice and illicit … [Read more...]
New US study lends support to Financial Transaction Tax
A new report from the Tax Policy Center (TPC), a U.S. nonpartisan joint project of the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, looks at the potential revenue yields from a Financial Transactions Tax (FTT) and how the burden of the tax would fall on the U.S. population. It also notes that the … [Read more...]
