4 ms·

Isn't it a consensus position among economists that corporate taxation is inefficient and badly targeted? That taxes on individuals (wages, goods&services, capi

Isn't it a consensus position among economists that corporate taxation is inefficient and badly targeted? That taxes on individuals (wages, goods&services, capital gains) and on land are easier to collect and better at providing desired incentives? Really, isn't a "race to the bottom" a virtuous cycle here? Kinda weird to see Yellen -- Treasury Secretary and former Fed Chair -- making this kind of statement.

bronzeage 5y ago
When the majority of wealth is held by billionaire corporate owners, and the only tax they pay is corporate tax, not even selling their shares, what other option do you have to tax them?
nonameiguess 5y ago
Actually a common reason given for having corporate taxes is they're easier to collect since you collect from fewer payers. The biggest problem is they obscure tax burden. All tax burden is ultimately born by individuals. If you levy on the corporation instead of the individual directly, then the burden just gets divided between clients, suppliers, owners, and employees, and how it get divides ends up depending upon the relative price elasticity of demand for each of their services. When taxes are levied on individuals directly, how the burden gets distributed can instead be codified in law. At least in that sense, corporate taxes are somewhat anti-democratic. Politicians and voters are out for blood on this, but what they really want is for the owners to pay more tax. That can be better accomplished by just taxing capital gains and carried interest. There is, of course, also tremendous deadweight loss in that business decisions are often dictated by what results in the best tax treatment rather than what is economically optimal. The fact that it actually makes financial sense to entirely relocate operations to other countries is itself a pretty big indictment of taxes like this. That's a huge amount of resources being allocated in a way that does not result in any improvement to the goods and services. But, to the point of this treaty, if they're not going to eliminate corporate taxes and tax owners directly instead, the next best thing is at least make the taxes the same everywhere so the relative change in rates will stop dictating business decisions.
- dantheman 5y ago
  Seems like it's easier to eliminate corporate taxes - no coordination needed at all.
ericffr 5y ago
Her point is that no country can survive with zero tax. Everyone knows that. In order to have roads, schools, hospitals, parks, police, you need everyone to chip in, specially huge corporations who know how to subvert the system for their own benefit (meaning their shareholders)
- dantheman 5y ago
  Why not just have property tax and pay everything off that?
throwaway34241 5y ago
The corporate profits that are being taxed normally would get distributed to shareholders via share buybacks or dividends (so will appear to them as capital gains or income). Taxing this is basically taxing money earned from owning things vs money earned from working. I'm not aware of a consensus that one is always better than the other. I would imagine it would depend on the circumstances of the economy and what the current tax rates are. If you tax income from owning things too much, that would probably discourage saving and investing money, but of course taxing wages discourages working (and lowers the after-tax income of workers). I would say that in the current environment, the cost of money (interest rate) for companies that want to make investments (building housing, factories, etc), is already pretty low by historical standards. One of the common problems with the corporate tax is that it's hard to say which country the profits belong to (global companies can shift the profits around very easily by changing the prices their international subsidiaries charge each other). The article is an attempt to address the profit-shifting issue. There are also other ways to address that, but they might be harder to implement since they would involve more substantial changes to the tax code.

bronzeage 5y ago

When the majority of wealth is held by billionaire corporate owners, and the only tax they pay is corporate tax, not even selling their shares, what other option do you have to tax them?

nonameiguess 5y ago

Actually a common reason given for having corporate taxes is they're easier to collect since you collect from fewer payers. The biggest problem is they obscure tax burden. All tax burden is ultimately born by individuals. If you levy on the corporation instead of the individual directly, then the burden just gets divided between clients, suppliers, owners, and employees, and how it get divides ends up depending upon the relative price elasticity of demand for each of their services. When taxes are levied on individuals directly, how the burden gets distributed can instead be codified in law. At least in that sense, corporate taxes are somewhat anti-democratic. Politicians and voters are out for blood on this, but what they really want is for the owners to pay more tax. That can be better accomplished by just taxing capital gains and carried interest. There is, of course, also tremendous deadweight loss in that business decisions are often dictated by what results in the best tax treatment rather than what is economically optimal. The fact that it actually makes financial sense to entirely relocate operations to other countries is itself a pretty big indictment of taxes like this. That's a huge amount of resources being allocated in a way that does not result in any improvement to the goods and services. But, to the point of this treaty, if they're not going to eliminate corporate taxes and tax owners directly instead, the next best thing is at least make the taxes the same everywhere so the relative change in rates will stop dictating business decisions.

dantheman 5y ago
Seems like it's easier to eliminate corporate taxes - no coordination needed at all.

ericffr 5y ago

Her point is that no country can survive with zero tax. Everyone knows that. In order to have roads, schools, hospitals, parks, police, you need everyone to chip in, specially huge corporations who know how to subvert the system for their own benefit (meaning their shareholders)

dantheman 5y ago
Why not just have property tax and pay everything off that?

throwaway34241 5y ago

The corporate profits that are being taxed normally would get distributed to shareholders via share buybacks or dividends (so will appear to them as capital gains or income). Taxing this is basically taxing money earned from owning things vs money earned from working. I'm not aware of a consensus that one is always better than the other. I would imagine it would depend on the circumstances of the economy and what the current tax rates are. If you tax income from owning things too much, that would probably discourage saving and investing money, but of course taxing wages discourages working (and lowers the after-tax income of workers). I would say that in the current environment, the cost of money (interest rate) for companies that want to make investments (building housing, factories, etc), is already pretty low by historical standards. One of the common problems with the corporate tax is that it's hard to say which country the profits belong to (global companies can shift the profits around very easily by changing the prices their international subsidiaries charge each other). The article is an attempt to address the profit-shifting issue. There are also other ways to address that, but they might be harder to implement since they would involve more substantial changes to the tax code.