“Squeaky clean” Cayman caught in the act – again

The Buck stops at Buck House

Does the Buck stop at Buckingham Palace?

From the U.S. Department of Justice:

“Cayman National Securities Ltd. (CNS) and Cayman National Trust Co. Ltd. (CNT), two Cayman Island affiliates of Cayman National Corporation . . . pleaded guilty to a criminal Information charging them with conspiring with many of their U.S. taxpayer-clients to hide more than $130 million in offshore accounts from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and to evade U.S. taxes on the income earned in those accounts.”

Continue reading ““Squeaky clean” Cayman caught in the act – again”

Tax haven Panama: giving the world the “middle finger”

Isabel de Saint Malo de Alvarado

Isabel de Saint Malo de Alvarado

Stephen Sackur and the BBC’s Hard Talk programme have been talking to Panama’s Vice President Isabel de Saint Malo de Alvarado. (It’s only available to UK-based viewers, unfortunately.)

She begins with a bout of self-congratulation about Panama, and Sackur responds with a wide number of allegations of corruption. He forces her to admit that Panama has been recalcitrant in this area.

The most pertinent section for our purposes is between around 8:30 and 13:30, where Sackur says: Continue reading “Tax haven Panama: giving the world the “middle finger””

International Women’s Day: tax justice is a feminist issue, every day.

Women’s Budget Group (UK): showing how gender issues can be addressed

International Women’s Day: Tax Justice is a feminist issue, every day.

By Liz Nelson

On International Women’s Day, let’s remember that tax justice is a feminist issue – every day. We’d like to use today to signal some significant milestones and forthcoming opportunities for understanding and addressing the gendered impacts of tax abuse. There is now some significant move in this area.

In 2014 a new network emerged, Women for Tax JusticeIn  our Tax Justice Focus edition (April, 2015) on gender  Mae Buenaventura quantified the gender impact of tax dodging by multinationals in Asia. She also reminded us of a ‘weather changing’ report  in 2014 by Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona, UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty, which highlighted the importance of adopting progressive tax policies to address poverty,  inequality, discrimination.  Continue reading “International Women’s Day: tax justice is a feminist issue, every day.”

How do top rate income tax cuts affect women?

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]On International Women’s Day, this is the first of two blogs on the subject of tax justice and gender.

The short answer to the question in our headline is that cuts to the top rate of income tax hit women particularly hard, not just because their disproportionate role in childcare and other family-related areas are hit by ensuing government spending cuts, but also because the top earners who are enjoying the tax-cut bonanza are predominantly men.

For more background on this, see our blog Why Gender Equality Requires More Tax Revenue by Diane Elson, chair of the UK Women’s Budget Group, and our TJN page dedicated to tax justice and gender issues.

Continue reading “How do top rate income tax cuts affect women?”

Taxing corporations: the Politics and Ideology of the Arm’s Length Principle

From their paper presentation "The Politics of Intra-Firm Trade": a picture of the Arm's Length Principle in action

The Arm’s Length Principle, in action. From “The Politics of Intra-Firm Trade” (later copied by Michaelangelo.)

Last year we posted a presentation by Matti Ylönen looking at the politics of the international tax system. Now he has written us a guest blog, based on his paper co-authored with Teivo Teivainen, which was a co-winner of the Amartya Sen Prize in October 2015.

Taxing corporations: the Politics and Ideology of the Arm’s Length Principle

A guest blog by Matti Ylönen

Few articles have been written about intra-firm trade that do not at least mention the “Arm’s Length Principle”, or ALP. A significant proportion of cross-border world trade takes place inside (as opposed to between) multinational corporations; and ever since the 1930s the ALP has been the key principle for regulating this trade. Continue reading “Taxing corporations: the Politics and Ideology of the Arm’s Length Principle”

Switzerland’s financial secrecy brought under the human rights spotlight 

Swiss flagSwitzerland – arguably the world’s most important tax haven – may soon face scrutiny from the United Nations human rights system over its role in facilitating cross-border tax abuse. A coalition of civil society bodies has filed a submission to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW,) the UN body mandated to oversee compliance with women’s human rights – focusing specifically on the extra-territorial impacts of Switzerland’s opaque financial legislation on women’s rights and gender equality, particularly in developing countries. 
Continue reading “Switzerland’s financial secrecy brought under the human rights spotlight “

Google, Facebook and a gradual realignment to the post-BEPS landscape

Prof. Sol Picciotto

Prof. Sol Picciotto

Last week we wrote an article entitled Facebook ‘to pay more UK tax’. Let’s not get carried away, analysing an announcement by Facebook that it will restructure its operations so as to pay more tax in the UK. This follows earlier news (on which we also commented) that Google had reached a deal with the UK authorities to pay more tax. Now a guest blog by Prof Sol Picciotto sheds further light on these deals, and sets them in a broader context.

Google, Facebook and a gradual realignment towards the post-BEPS landscape

A guest blog by Sol Picciotto Continue reading “Google, Facebook and a gradual realignment to the post-BEPS landscape”

US Fortune 500 cos hold $2.4trn offshore, dodging up to $695bn in tax

CTJFrom Citizens for Tax Justice, a major new report:

“A diverse array of companies are using offshore tax havens. . . All told, American Fortune 500 corporations are avoiding up to $695 billion in U.S. federal income taxes by holding $2.4 trillion of “permanently reinvested” profits offshore. In their latest annual financial reports, 27 of these corporations reveal that they have paid an income tax rate of 10 percent or less in countries where these profits are officially held, indicating that most of these monies are likely in offshore tax havens.”

And that number is rising, fast.

Continue reading “US Fortune 500 cos hold $2.4trn offshore, dodging up to $695bn in tax”

UN asks IMF, World Bank, to study illicit financial flows

Eurodad's report highlighting the extent of official research into IFF

Eurodad’s 2009 report highlighting the extent of official research into IFF

Highlighting a powerful new(ish) study: the final report on illicit financial flows and human rights of the UN Independent Expert, Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky. It’s well worth reading the whole thing, but here are some of the top lines and just a few of the many important recommendations:

Continue reading “UN asks IMF, World Bank, to study illicit financial flows”

Facebook ‘to pay more UK tax’. Let’s not get carried away

FBUpdate: see Prem Sikka’s article “Facebook looks set to pay more UK tax but it might not be as much as you think.”

The UK seems to be a bit of a canary in the mine on international corporation tax at the moment. This is because the British public is very, very exercised about these issues. The latest twist is a story, which the Guardian has written up under the headline “Facebook to pay millions more in UK tax.” The summary goes:

“Starting in April, the world’s largest social network will change its policy so that revenue generated from its largest advertisers displaying content on Facebook will be routed through the UK rather than Ireland. The change is expected to generate higher taxable profits in Britain and forms part of the US company’s plan to mitigate criticism of tax avoidance.”

Here’s a TJN statement about this, for starters. Alex Cobham, TJN’s Research Director, said: Continue reading “Facebook ‘to pay more UK tax’. Let’s not get carried away”

2016 Honesty Oscars: Stop the Bleeding song wins

The results of the 2016 Honesty Oscars are announced, and the winner is this song from the Stop the Bleeding campaign. Congratulations.

Will the US Implement Country by Country Reporting?

us flagThe BEPS Monitoring Group, an expert body (backed by TJN and others) that works on international corporate tax issues, has published its comments on draft US Treasury Regulations on Country by Country Reporting (CbCR, for an explanation for newcomers, see here). Given the large number of multinational enterprises (MNEs) headquartered in the US, it is crucial for the US to adopt the scheme, if it is to work at all. Continue reading “Will the US Implement Country by Country Reporting?”

The other four fifths of the corporate tax “incidence” question

David Quentin

David Quentin, guest blogger

We’ve done two blogs in the past week on the fraught question of the ‘incidence’ of the corporate income tax: that is, the question of who ultimately bears the burden for paying the tax. Is it the shareholders of the corporation that gets taxed? Is it the workers? Is it customers? Who is it?

The first blog looks at the nonsense routinely spoken about this issue; the second focuses on a recent television debate between TJN’s Alex Cobham and Tim Worstall.

Now we offer a new guest blog by David Quentin, a UK tax barrister, who fills out the picture by taking a much broader-perspective view of the issues.

The other four fifths of the corporate tax “incidence” question

A guest blog by David Quentin. Adapted from his original post. Continue reading “The other four fifths of the corporate tax “incidence” question”

US official on the influence of NGOs on taxing multinationals

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Our tweet of the day:

[/vc_column_text][vc_raw_js]

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

[/vc_raw_js][vc_column_text]The last, truncated paragraph in that tweet reads:

“Continued media coverage about alleged tax abuse, increasingly aggressive actions from tax administrations and the general terms of debate about standard international tax practices show that multinationals have lost control of the “narrative,” Stack said.”

Not only that, but the story begins like with a similarly eye-popping statement:

“The U.S. business community has lost the global public relations battle on international tax planning—and should consider whether a proposed global minimum tax would be better for their interests than continuing with the status quo, a top Treasury Department official said.”

The business community has for so long been busy eating everyone else’s breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and getting everyone else to pick up the tab, that it’s nice to see the tables turned a bit.

This has been achieved, above all, by virtue of taking the debates outside of fiddly, technical arenas and into the economic and political arenas: where it matters most.

But let’s not forget that despite our collective impact on setting the political agenda, the abuses remain rampant. This fight has only just begun.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Open Data for Tax Justice: Launch! #OD4TJ

od4tj

Every year countries lose billions of dollars to tax avoidance, tax evasion and more generally to illicit financial flows. According to a recent IMF estimate around $700 billion of tax revenues is lost each year due to profit-shifting. In developing countries the loss is estimated to be around $200 billion, which as a share of GDP represents nearly three times the loss suffered by OECD countries. Meanwhile, economist Gabriel Zucman estimates that certain components of undeclared offshore wealth total above $7 trillion, implying tax losses of $200 billion annually; Jim Henry’s work for TJN suggests the full total of offshore assets may range between $21 trillion and $32 trillion.

We want to transform the way that data is used for advocacy, journalism and public policy to address this urgent challenge by creating of a global network of civil society groups, investigative reporters, data journalists, civic hackers, researchers, public servants and others.

Today, Open Knowledge and the Tax Justice Network are delighted to announce the launch of a new initiative in this area: Open Data for Tax Justice. We want to initiate a global network of people and organisations working to create, use and share data to improve advocacy and journalism around tax justice. The website is: http://datafortaxjustice.net/ and using the hashtag #od4tj.

The network will work to rally campaigners, civil society groups, investigative reporters, data journalists, civic hackers, researchers, public servants and others; it will aim to catalyse collaborations and forge lasting alliances between the tax justice movement and the open data movement. We have received a huge level of support and encouragement from preliminary discussions with our initial members, and look forward to expanding the network and its activities over the coming months.

What is on the cards? We’re working on a white paper on what a global data infrastructure for tax justice might look like. We also want to generate more practical guidance materials for data projects – as well as to build momentum with online and offline events. We will kick off with some preliminary activities at this year’s global Open Data Day on Saturday 5th March. Tax justice will be one of the main themes of the London Open Data Day, and if you’d like to have a go at doing something tax related at an event that you’re going to, you can join the discussion here.

od4tj members

Tax Justice Network vs. Tim Worstall: a debate on corporate tax

Tim Worstall, a British commentator who has launched a number of vitriolic and personalised public attacks on TJN and TJN staff members in the the past, has been in debate with TJN’s Research Director, Alex Cobham, on the subject of corporate tax. (For a flavour of the extraordinary level of vitriol, see this.)

Anyway, here’s the debate.

Make your own minds up about who came off Worst.

On the much-debated subject of tax incidence, Worstall knows (because, as he states, he reads TJN’s outputs assiduously) that the nonpartisan U.S. Congressional Budget Office has highlighted studies that either find “capital bears the majority of the corporate tax burden” or that “even in an open economy, capital could bear virtually the entire tax burden and that the open-economy assumption is not sufficient to shift the burden of the corporate tax from capital to labor.”  (And he might like to answer the question of who the ‘workers’ are in a hedge fund or a shell company.)

As this 2012 paper (update: we mistakenly cited it as a CBO paper in the original: please see the comments below this post) put it in the conclusion:

“At the end of the searching, I find some evidence that suggests that corporate taxation may lower wages, but the preponderance of evidence does not suggest any wage effects from corporate taxation.
. . .

I close with a political economy point, mentioned by Lawrence Summers at a Hamilton Project forum in 2007.  He noted that it was indeed possible that corporate stockholders and managers who resist the corporate tax are not really acting in their own interests because they do not understand corporate tax incidence, since corporate taxes will ultimately be borne by their workers. But it seems far more plausible that they have calculated their interests correctly.”

See much more on this question of tax incidence here.

See also Tim Worstall, curious British attack dog.

 

Should we be giving tax breaks to tobacco companies?

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]economist tobaccoFrom Citizens for Tax Justice in the U.S., a post that begins by discussing federal tax breaks for manufacturing corporations. And they ask:

Tobacco companies “manufacture” cigarettes—but do Americans, or lawmakers, really think it’s a good idea for the federal government to subsidise this activity? New financial reports from major corporations in this sector show that cigarette makers are enjoying substantial manufacturing tax breaks for producing products that kill people.”

Continue reading “Should we be giving tax breaks to tobacco companies?”

Offshore Ireland implicated in bank collapse, once again

The IFSC in Dublin: corruption central?

The IFSC in Dublin: corrupting markets, worldwide

Update: now on Naked Capitalism (and note the comments underneath.)

Update 2, March 1: now with added video at the end: a Live Register report on the IFSC, from 2012.

We have written a great deal about the role of Ireland and the Irish Financial Services Centre (IFSC) and its role as an offshore haven, posing risks not just for tax but for global financial stability too. As Prof. Jim Stewart and others have pointed out: Ireland played an important role in the global financial crisis that emerged in 2007, and in the aftershocks, under a spectacularly tax haven mentality.

Now an excellent piece of digging by two Bloomberg reporters, Donal Griffin and Joe Brennan, takes the story forwards with a tale about Vneshprombank Ltd., a Moscow financial institution that has just had its banking licence revoked after Russian regulators found a $2.5 billion hole in its balance sheet, and a related Irish special purpose vehicle called VPB Funding Ltd.  Continue reading “Offshore Ireland implicated in bank collapse, once again”

Belgian tax treaties cost developing countries millions every year

The Belgian network of tax treaties. Click to enlarge

The Belgian network of tax treaties. (Click to enlarge)

New report 11.11.11: Belgian tax treaties cost developing countries millions every year

A guest blog by Jan van de Poel 

As a consequence of dozens of unbalanced tax treaties, negotiated by the Belgian government, developing countries miss out on at least 35 million Euros on tax revenues each year, a new 11.11.11-report finds. While the stated objective of these treaties is to prevent double taxation, they often undermine developing countries’ capacity to invest in sustainable development. 11.11.11 urges Belgian authorities to review these treaties. Continue reading “Belgian tax treaties cost developing countries millions every year”

Pfizer: tax dodger, price gouger

PfizerA new report from Americans for Tax Fairness concludes:

“In addition to dodging its fair share of taxes, Pfizer—maker of Celebrex, Lipitor, Lyrica, and Viagra, among many other health-care products—has also been aggressively raising prescription drug prices, thereby straining patients and our health care system and in some cases putting needed medications out of reach.

By dodging taxes while boosting prescription drug prices, Pfizer squeezes American families and communities from two sides at once. In the company’s biggest insult to America yet, Pfizer’s merger will allow it to go on enjoying all the benefits of being based here—everything from a publicly educated workforce to an excellent communications infrastructure to a reliable patent system—without adequately paying to support them.”

Continue reading “Pfizer: tax dodger, price gouger”

A Leak in Paradise – screening of this extraordinary documentary film about Swiss whistleblower Ruedi Elmer

Ana Gomes (S&D) and Fabio De Masi (GUE/NGL)

Members of the Intergroup on Integrity, Transparency, Corruption and Organised Crime (ITCO)

invite you to the screening of

– A LEAK IN PARADISE –

Continue reading “A Leak in Paradise – screening of this extraordinary documentary film about Swiss whistleblower Ruedi Elmer”

Corporate tax: the great incidence hoax

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Corp tax11We’ve mentioned the incidence question several times before, but TJN’s Director John Christensen was at a debate in London last night on the future of the corporate income tax, alongside Mike Devereux of the Oxford Centre for Business Taxation; Helen Miller of the Institute for Fiscal Studies; Simon Walker of the Institute of Directors, and Margaret Hodge, chair of the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Tax.

It was a wide-ranging discussion, but one question that came up repeatedly was the question of the ‘incidence’ of the corporate income. Put most crudely, is it corporate shareholders who ultimately shoulder the tax charge, or is it workers? There are a number of people who claim that research demonstrates that the tax charge falls squarely on workers: as a top UK tax official put it:

“The consensus, among economists at least, is that it’s predominantly the employee who foots the bill [for the corporation tax.]”

It is this claim that is the great incidence hoax. There is no such consensus: and we argue that the opposite is true.

We thought we’d take the opportunity to re-publish a section of our 2015 document Ten Reasons to Defend the Corporate Income Tax. Don’t forget to go to the original for the all-important footnotes. (See pp 7-8 on this question.)  Continue reading “Corporate tax: the great incidence hoax”