The impact of tax planning on forward-looking effective tax rates : final report

Multinational companies have the opportunity to apply profit shifting strategies to reduce their tax payments in high-tax countries and minimize the overall effective tax burden on their global profits. Both the European Commission and the OECD have taken action to counter such tax planning strategies. This study provides a general insight into the effect of different profit shifting strategies on effective tax rates for cross-border investments between the 28 EU member states and the US. In particular, this study enhances the baseline findings of ongoing research conducted by ZEW on behalf of the European Commission.