The Influence of Corporate Taxation on Economic Growth: The Failure of Tax Quota?

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the impact of taxation on long-term economic growth with special emphasis on corporate taxation using alternative indicator of tax burden which is called World Tax Index (WTI). The WTI was constructed by authors using hard data as well as soft data expressing qualified expert opinion gained from a questionnaire survey conducted among tax specialist from OECD countries. It is a multi-criteria index consisting of several sub-indices that deal with different groups of taxes, which are basically consistent with the classification according to the OECD. All the parts are used in further regression analysis to approximate the tax burden in growth model. As an alternative, also the tax quota is used, being the most applied indicator of tax burden. Results show that tax quota is not suitable for tax burden approximation, especially in case of corporate taxes or VAT. Corporate tax burden negatively influence long-term economic growth, as suggested by economic theory.