Virtual conference: Where next for global taxing rights?

Technical and political analyses of the OECD tax reform

Hosted by the Tax Justice Network on 11 December 2019

Read Alex Cobham’s blog post summarising the day’s discussions | Read our blog post about the conference format

As urgent reshaping of the international tax system has risen up the geopolitical agenda, the OECD’s tax reforms announced in January 2019 are proceeding at a rapid pace. The proposals set out to go “beyond the arm’s length principle”, introducing elements of unitary taxation and formulary apportionment, with the aim of redistributing taxing rights to the countries where real economic activity takes place.

To date, however, there has been little public analysis of the likely effects of these reforms and questions have been raised as to whether the current proposals are comprehensive enough to provide the drastic changes the international tax system needs to keep up with the changing landscape of multinational companies.

This one-day virtual conference hosted by the Tax Justice Network brought together international experts including speakers from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Intergovernmental Group of Twenty-Four (G24), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the World Bank (WB) and the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT) to provide technical analyses of the current proposals and consider the following questions:

• How do the current reforms compare to alternative proposals tabled by other international institutions and civil society organisations?
• What are the implications of the reforms for lower-income countries, particularly on tax bases, as well as those of OECD members?
• How far do the suggested reforms achieve their intended goals of redistribution of taxing rights and tightening up on tax avoidance?
• What are the political challenges within the OECD reform? And, looking to the future, what potential is there for involvement in the decision making process from other international bodies such as the United Nations?

View the conference programme

Download conference slides

Keynote I: ‘The maldistribution of global taxing rights, and how to fix it’ and Q&A

Panel I: ‘The revenue impacts of redistributing taxing rights’ and Q&A

Keynote II: ‘The G24 proposal, and the challenges of the Inclusive Framework’

Watch the conference in full

Welcome and Keynote I: ‘The maldistribution of global taxing rights, and how to fix it’ and Q&A

Panel I: ‘The revenue impacts of redistributing taxing rights’ and Q&A

Keynote II: ‘The G24 proposal, and the challenges of the Inclusive Framework’ and Panel II: ‘Which way now for the reform and redistribution of global taxing rights?’ and Q&A

Shared papers and resources

Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation and Tax Justice Network

https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/j3p48/

International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD)

https://www.ictd.ac/theme/taxing-the-digitalising-economy/

International Monetary Fund (IMF)

https://www.imf.org/~/media/Files/Publications/WP/2019/wpiea2019213-print-pdf.ashx

https://www.imf.org/~/media/Files/Publications/PP/2019/PPEA2019007.ashx

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

https://www.oecd.org/tax/beps/programme-of-work-to-develop-a-consensus-solution-to-the-tax-challenges-arising-from-the-digitalisation-of-the-economy.pdf

https://www.oecd.org/tax/beps/public-consultation-document-secretariat-proposal-unified-approach-pillar-one.pdf

https://www.oecd.org/tax/beps/public-consultation-document-global-anti-base-erosion-proposal-pillar-two.pdf.pdf

South Centre

https://us5.campaign-archive.com/?u=fa9cf38799136b5660f367ba6&id=a76ef527b7

https://us5.campaign-archive.com/?u=fa9cf38799136b5660f367ba6&id=000234a6c6

World Bank

Materials on international tax

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/735001569857911590/International-Tax-Reform-Digitalization-and-Developing-Economies

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/325021540479671671/The-Cost-and-Benefits-of-Tax-Treaties-with-Investment-Hubs-Findings-from-Sub-Saharan-Africa

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/168211552400964868/Low-Tax-Jurisdictions-and-Preferential-Regimes-Policy-Gaps-in-Developing-Economies

World Development Report 2020 (particularly chapters 3 and 10)

https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/32437/9781464814570_Ch03.pdf

https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/32437/9781464814570_Ch10.pdf

https://www.worldbank.org/en/events/2019/10/04/strengthening-tax-systems-in-a-digitalizing-world#1