This paper examines the relative merits of two dominant economic instruments for reducing pollution—”green” taxes and tradable permits. Theoretically, the two instruments share many similarities, and on balance, neither seems preferable to the other. In practice, however, most countries...

This study focused on environmental tax measures, and on allocation, pricing, and taxation of Iceland’s major hydropower and geothermal resources. Measures to secure the tax base for the corporate income tax (CIT) are proposed. Taxation of the financial sector can be improved by a number...

This paper provides an overview of the key economic factors that shape tax policy reform in many high-income countries, developing countries, and/or transition economies. The paper describes and evaluates global and regional developments with respect to tax rates and revenue ratios over the last...

Tax reform in Latin America during the 1980s emphasized broad-based, low-rate consumption taxes over steeply progressive income and property taxes, primarily to simplify the tax structure and facilitate tax administration. While tax reform need not necessarily raise tax-to-GDP ratios, countries...

The paper provides an analysis and discussion of key structural implications of the 2007 and 2008 welfare and tax reforms in the Czech Republic. Based on a detailed micro-study of marginal and average effective tax rates for individuals at various points along the earnings curve, it concludes...

The paper studies the setting of optimal fiscal policy in a second-best world with environmental externalities. The optimal second-best pollution tax is shown to lie below the first-best Pigovian tax, particularly if substitution between labor and polluting intermediate inputs is easy, the labor...

This paper reviews the fiscal reform of the Czech Republic, its key reform measures, and structural implications. The study also focuses on key challenges and demographic pressures facing the Czech economy, and describes the analytical framework of Global Fiscal Model (GFM) with technical...

This paper identifies tax factors in 21 developing countries that have an impact on foreign direct investment flows. It categorizes those factors into issues associated with tax coordination; tax rates and rate structures; and composition of the tax base. Recent actions by countries reveal no...

This paper reviews the tax policy debate in the United States on the move of the corporation tax from its present worldwide basis to a territorial basis, and considers the implications for the United States and the rest of the world. It finds that there is no clear view on whether the move would...