This paper explores the administrative challenges posed to developing countries as a result of the increasing emphasis in fiscal regimes for natural resource extraction since the Second World War on income-based taxes, including both corporate income and resource rent taxes, as opposed to royalties. The paper identifies both the political consequences and technical challenges (particularly…
Read moreThe journey from coercion to persuasion to drive tax compliance started gradually for the Rwanda Revenue Authority (RRA). This is shown in the mission and core value statements that underpin the tax administration’s activities in service delivery and trade facilitation. Recently the RRA has undertaken aggressive tax education and sensitisation campaigns in order to influence…
Read moreAlthough field experiments in tax compliance represent a growing area of research, the literature has so far focussed exclusively on high and middle-income countries. This paper starts to fill this gap by reporting the results of a tax field experiment in Rwanda, while also highlighting some characteristics that may be common to other low-income countries….
Read moreLarge-scale field experiments on tax compliance have been a thriving field of research in many regions of the world. However, Africa is still lagging behind, as administrative data from anonymised returns is available only in a handful of countries. To the best of our knowledge, there is as yet no published evidence of a tax…
Read moreThis paper aims to advance understanding about the relationship between taxation and inequality in developing countries, focusing on the recent experience of Latin America. Although the tax system was regressive in the 1990s, tax changes promoted equality in the first decade of the 2000s. In particular, the increasing contribution of direct taxes with respect to…
Read moreThis paper is the first in a series of three studies looking at tax compliance using administrative data from Rwanda. It discusses the use of administrative data for tax research – specifically anonymised taxpayers records, which have become increasingly available on the African continent. The paper starts by critically summarising the key advantages and disadvantages…
Read moreThe proposals resulting from the G20/Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) project on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) include a drive for mandatory binding arbitration of international tax disputes, strongly supported by business. This issue should be considered in the context of the reasons for and nature of international tax disputes. The bulk…
Read moreThis paper considers what Africa’s response should be to the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project. The paper acknowledges that BEPS concerns for developing countries (such as those in Africa) may not necessarily be the same as those for developed countries. The author first explains the concepts of tax avoidance and tax planning,…
Read moreThis paper explores the issues raised for international tax rules of explicitly treating multinational enterprises (MNEs) as single or unitary firms. It first briefly explains why reform of international corporate taxation is important particularly for developing countries, then outlines the flaws in the current system. It discusses the impetus created for reforms, and the political…
Read moreThis analysis uses panel data from thirty-five departments over the period 2001-2011 to analyse the effect of grants from central government on local revenue mobilisation in Côte d’Ivoire. The study considers the two components of local own revenue in Côte d’Ivoire: tax revenue (LTR) and non-tax revenue (LNTR). To perform the investigation, the analysis is…
Read moreIn spite of the importance of taxation for political and economic development, we know relatively little about the conditions under which citizens might not exact a political cost on leaders for adopting a particular tax. Drawing on insights from the literature on institutional design, this article examines how certain features of taxes – such as…
Read moreIn June 2014, Uganda announced the temporary cessation of bilateral tax treaty negotiations, and a review of its policy towards such treaties. The main effect of tax treaties is to divide up the ‘rights’ to tax cross-border investment between the state parties, which reduces the possibility that businesses will incur double taxation; in doing so,…
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