The application of the value-added tax to public sector bodies, non-profit organizations and charitable organizations substantially departs from full taxation in most VAT regimes around the world. The problems with the mostly exempt regime for those organizations are reviewed. Options to modify...

How to tax financial services is in many ways the key frontier issue for VAT in developed countries. No convincing conceptually correct and practical solution for capturing the bulk of financial services under the VAT has yet been developed anywhere. Developing and transitional countries face...

How to tax financial services is in many ways the key ‘frontier’ issue for VAT in developed countries. No convincing conceptually correct and practical solution for capturing the bulk of financial services under the VAT has yet been developed anywhere. Developing and transitional countries...

An empirical model is developed to estimate the probability of a given tax status based on firm characteristics. A structural switching regression model of the firm’s demand for capital goods is next specified and incorporates expressions for the user cost of capital which account for tax...

This paper is divided into three main sections. In the first section, we set out briefly the standard theoretical case for both a general equalization transfer and for the incorporation of expenditure needs as a key factor in the design of such transfers and discuss how this case may be...

In this paper we argue that a more legitimate and responsive state is an essential factor for a more adequate level of tax effort in developing countries. while at first glance giving such advice to poor countries seeking to increase their tax ratios may not seem more helpful than telling them...

This paper considers some of the key instrumental components of intergovernmental fiscal relations that arise in the Russian Federation -- expenditures, revenues, transfers, borrowing, and institutional arrangements -- in comparison both to Canada’s lengthy experience with federalism and to a...

This paper reviews the development of property tax policy in the province of Ontario, Canada, over the last two centuries. This review underlines the highly political nature of property tax policy at the local level in the province. Two important realities make the issue highly salient at the...

We consider in this paper how emerging countries may in practice best design and develop tax policies, given the complex economic and political environments they face. After an overview of what tax systems look like around the world, we discuss the principal objectives that countries may attempt...

In this paper we discuss some recent critical literature on VAT in developing countries relating to its revenue productivity, its equity, and its impact on the development of the formal economy. Illustrating our argument with reference to two recent country studies (of Ukraine and Jamaica) we...