It might seem a strange commemoration of the Carter Royal Commission on Taxation to review the Commission’s consideration of value-added tax (VAT) reform. The Commission neither favoured consumption as the primary tax base nor endorsed the VAT as the most suitable sales tax from which to tax...

The impact of COVID-19 on fiscal systems worldwide is exactly the type of crisis thought necessary to precipitate major tax reform. This article contends that if Australia is about to embark on significant tax reform, then this must be accompanied by a full and frank account of the respective...

The subject matter of taxation provides something of a quandary for law and economics: it simultaneously offers a field of scholarship in which analysts share an equally enthusiastic embrace of efficiency as an organising principle but, in doing so, demonstrates the insufficienc of efficiency...

Although taxing expenditure on consumption on a transactional basis eliminates some of the measurement difficulties involved in taxing consumption, it does not eliminate all issues. VAT adjustments deal with events that arise after a transaction occurs which have the effect of altering the VAT...

This article examines recent Australian reforms to extend the Goods and Services Tax to imports of low-value goods. The reforms will move Australia from maintaining one of the highest thresholds for the relief of payment of the GST on the importation of low-value goods to a first-mover in its...

This chapter contests the claim made by Murphy and Nagel that the choice of tax base is of only instrumental significance to economic justice (The Myth of Ownership (OUP, 2002, 8. 98)). We agree with Murphy and Nagel that what ultimately justifies taxation is its contribution to just outcomes,...

The OECD International VAT/GST guidelines (OECD Guidelines) are the most significant global attempt to coordinate place of taxation rules for cross‑border supplies of services and intangibles so that the final consumption of such supplies are effectively taxed on a destination basis. However,...

This book explores one of the most significant trends in the evolution of global tax systems by asking how, within less than half a century, the value-added tax (VAT) has risen from relative obscurity to become one of the world's most dominant revenue instruments. Despite its significance, very...

The paper explores the origins of the Value Added Tax (VAT) and its rapid global rise from relative obscurity in the mid-twentieth century to its near worldwide adoption today. The paper highlights general trends in VAT design and provides a critical overview of the explanations provided for the...

Value-added Tax (VAT) has become one of the most pervasive tax instruments across the developed and, increasingly, the developing world. However, despite broad-based consumption tax reform dominating the Australian taxation agenda from the 1970s onwards, Australia did not introduce VAT until...