After a promising start to an ambitious economic turn-around program, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will have more difficulty with tax changes scheduled to come in over the next few years.
EPA/Harish Tyagi
Another record trade deficit for Japan is raising doubts about Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s “Abenomics” strategy for economic revival. The new figures follow poor manufacturing sentiment numbers earlier…
Tax protests outside a Starbucks in London. But do people really care enough to make a difference?
Steve Parsons/PA
The tax arrangements of major brands such as Google, Apple and Amazon have prompted a fierce debate over questions of organisational ethics, social justice and international co-operation. But as a consumer…
Lame duck, dying swan - headline writers have had fun with the treasurer’s sixth budget, but the fact is this budget will be remembered for its fiscal irresponsibility.
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It has been pretty difficult to get too excited about the latest budget – it is a lame Swan effort from a dying government. It will mostly be remembered as a monument to fiscal irresponsibility. The budget…
This year’s federal budget failed to provide any hint of meaningful tax reform for businesses and individuals.
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Budget night has come and gone again. For those sad folks (I count myself among them) who follow tax and fiscal policy obsessively, it’s the most glamorous night of the year. But the budget does matter…
The mining tax is fraught with significant design issues. But can it be fixed?
AAP
The Commonwealth government’s mining tax, the minerals resource rent tax (MRRT), has been a continuing source of controversy. It is easy to point to its significant problems, but a considerable challenge…
The case for significant, productivity-enhancing tax reform has been made by the Henry Review - but the challenge will be for meaningful reform not to swallowed by pre-election noise.
AAP
Reform of Australia’s taxation system has to be high on the agenda to raise national productivity, for greater simplicity, and to improve equity. However, because of the magnitude of the challenges to…
Google’s tax-minimisation strategy is causing problems for the Australian Taxation Office.
AAP
It might well have been a case of a stopped clock being right twice a day, but on the very day I had an article in The Conversation called Giant profits, tiny tax bills: time to close loopholes on corporate…
Despite earning $201 million in revenue, Google Australia paid $74,000 in tax last year.
AAP
For many companies, tax is a cost of business rather than the price we pay for civilised society. The driver for tax minimisation or even avoidance is clear: the less tax business pays, the more profit…
Does Australia’s company tax rate place a significant impost on local businesses?
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Kevin Davis, Australian Centre for Financial Studies
Treasurer Swan could reduce the headline corporate tax rate from its current 30% rate to just over 15%, with virtually no consequences for government tax revenue with one simple piece of legislation: simply…
Last week was quite a big week in tax, although when the dust had settled it was not clear what — if anything — had really happened. First, the Treasurer announced in the Mid Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook…
The Business Tax Working Group failed to reach a consensus on how to fund a lower corporate tax rate.
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The release by the Business Tax Working Group of the Draft Final Report represents a lost opportunity for business tax reform. The Group dumped its original broader base, lower rate, revenue neutral approach…
Tax reform or trickery? Treasurer Wayne Swan’s plan for businesses to pay a monthly tax bill instead of a quarterly one has been met with acrimony from the business community.
AAP
One of the more contentious issues in the 2012-13 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook (MYEFO) is a tax-timing change. Corporate income tax will be paid monthly instead of quarterly for very large corporations…
There are economy-wide gains to be made from lowering the corporate tax rate, but businesses will need to make concessions of their own.
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Yesterday, the government’s business tax working group released its discussion paper on possibilities for tax reform. The paper makes a case for a broader base and lower tax rate (the corporate tax is…