Over the past few years, policymakers have argued that everything from Apple's Irish tax deal to patent boxes to the LuxLeaks tax rulings represent “harmful tax competition.” Despite the ubiquity of this term, however, there is no internationally accepted definition of so-called harmful tax...

11 European countries now operate IP Box regimes that provide substantially reduced rates of corporate tax for income derived from important forms of intellectual property. We incorporate these policies into forward-looking measures of the cost of capital, effective marginal tax rates and...

Governments use tax expenditures to boost investment, innovation and employment. However, these schemes are largely opaque, costly and often ineffective in reaching their stated goals. They also frequently trigger unwanted side effects. In order to improve the performance of these tools, the...

Critical tax theory identifies systemic imbalances in taxation that impose disproportionally high tax burdens on groups who lack or fail to exercise political power. This article focuses on foreigners as an ideal taxpaying group because it does not vote. The article identifies some ways in which...

Tax competition arguments suggest that governements that operate in an open economy (such as local governments) should not and will not rely on non-benefit taxes, such as the income tax. Yet we observe reliance on income taxes by local governments in many countries, and such reliance changes...

This paper tests new implications of the asymmetric tax competition model on diesel excise taxes in the European Union (EU). I extend the standard tax competition model by replacing the unit demand assumption with iso-elastic demand. As a result, not only the level of the equilibrium tax but...

This paper develops a competition theory framework that evaluates an important aspect of the OECD's Harmful Tax Practices Initiative against tax havens. We show that the sequential nature of the process is harmful and more costly than a "big bang" multilateral agreement. The sequentiality may...

This paper tests new implications of the asymmetric tax competition model on diesel excise taxes in the European Union (EU). I extend the standard tax competition model by replacing the unit demand assumption with iso-elastic demand. As a result, not only the level of the equilibrium tax but...

Since the mid-1990s, countries offering tax systems that facilitate international tax avoidance and evasion have been facing growing political pressure to comply with the internationally agreed standards of exchange of tax information. Using data of German investments in tax havens, we find...

Tax competition arguments suggest that governements that operate in an open economy (such as local governments) should not and will not rely on non-benefit taxes, such as the income tax. Yet we observe reliance on income taxes by local governments in many countries, and such reliance changes...