In 1999 the Ralph Committee recommended sweeping reforms to the Australian income tax system. Its final report, consisted of eight parts and made 280 recommendations. Many of these have since passed into law in a staggered series of stages since 1999. Numerous CGT-related recommendations were...

It is contended that Australia's current realisation based capital gains tax represents a poor second best solution to the ideal of accruals . The realisation based system is simply too costly. It creates economic distortions, it is unfair as it principally benefits a small percentage of the...

This article considers concerns about Australia's capital gains tax (CGT) discount (providing generally for a 50 per cent discount on taxation of gains of resident taxpayers other than companies from disposal of assets held for more than 12 months) related to fiscal adequacy, and horizontal and...

The Ralph Committee, consisting of three leading Australian businessmen, John Ralph (Chairman), Rick Allert and Bob Joss, was established in 1998 to make recommendations on reforms to the Australian tax system. Relevantly, the Ralph Committee sought to achieve three national taxation objectives:...

In the latter half of the 1980s the tax climate in Australia and New Zealand changed markedly. While throughout the world there were major tax reforms, the changes in Australasia were more fundamental, and both structural and radical. Major changes that were adopted in one or both of the two...

This article begins by examining the relationship between thin capitalisation rules and double tax treaties. After examining the potential for a fundamental conflict in this area it looks at the OECD's attempts to resolve the problem (in section 2). In sections 3 and 4, the article examines the...

There is no doubt that the tax laws of many countries are complex and difficult to comply with administratively. In particular, Australia, New Zealand and the United States have tax systems that are generally recognized as complex especially for small businesses. They also have the distinction...

This paper analyses the methods adopted by Australia and New Zealand to tax companies and their shareholders in four key periods from 1945 to 2005. For each period the major concern of the paper is with an analysis of the factors contributing to effective tax rates for different types of...