Capital gains taxes pose a host of technical and political design problems and yet, while the literature on the theory of capital gains taxation is substantial, little has been published on how governments have addressed these dilemmas. Written by a team of distinguished international experts, Capital Gains Taxation addresses the gap in the literature; it explains how a number of countries tax capital gains and the successes and pitfalls of these methods. Examining key issues in the theory and practice of capital gains taxation in a general context, this book also provides a detailed analysis of the tax systems of Australia, Canada, China, India, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, the UK and the US. It questions whether capital gains should be taxed in the same way as ordinary income, considers the rate at which they ought to be taxed, if indeed they should be at all, and compares the taxation on realisation of capital gains versus on an accruals basis. Eloquent and astute, Capital Gains Taxation will be a crucial point of reference for students and scholars of tax law and policy. Its pragmatic approach will also benefit tax practitioners, policy-makers and tax authorities. Contributors include: R. Avi-Yonah, P. Baker, M. Bowler-Smith, D. Duff, C. Elliffe, S. Griffiths, E.C.C.M. Kemmeren, M. Littlewood, A. O'Connell, J. Roeleveld, D.P. Sengupta, D. White, Y. Xu, D. Zelik

Tax Law and the Environment: A Multidisciplinary and Worldwide Perspective takes a multidisciplinary approach to explore the ways how tax policy can is used solve environmental problems throughout the world, using a multi-jurisdictional and multidisciplinary approach. Environmental taxation involves using taxes to impose a cost on environmentally harmful activities or tax subsidies to provide preferred tax treatment to more sustainable alternatives to those harmful activities. This book provides a detailed analysis of environmental taxation, with examples from around the world. As the extraction, processing and use of energy use resources is has been a major cause of environmental harm, this book explores the taxation and subsidization of both fossil fuels and renewable energy. Its analysis of the past, present, and future potential of environmental taxation will help policymakers move economies toward sustainability, as well as and informing students, academics, and citizens about tax solutions for pressing environmental issues.

This book analyses the impact of European tax and benefit systems on incentives to create and take up jobs. European policymakers face tough choices as reforms to these systems are costly and recognising and understanding the complex trade-offs involved - a pre-condition to pushing the reform process forward - is the aim of this volume. The authors, experts in public and welfare economics, investigate the problems involved in re-designing tax and benefit systems in Europe, the cross-country spillovers of 'bad' domestic policies and the peer pressure from closer policy co-operation in EMU. They examine reforms in tax and welfare systems and suggest ways in which to improve their efficiency without undermining the equitable foundations of the European social model. While aiming at a high degree of generality, the analyses are rooted firmly in the experience of European countries and the conclusions are therefore all the more relevant and of interest to policymakers in Europe, as well as the rest of the world. The blend of theoretical and institutional analysis, policy suggestions and case studies of relevant European success stories will ensure this book appeals to policymakers and scholars of welfare, European and labour studies.

Countries eliminate the burden of double taxation for their taxpayers who engage in cross-border business activities by negotiating tax treaties with other countries. In the case of developing countries, tax treaties are often entered into with the additional purpose of attracting foreign investment as a path towards development. It is not clear, however, what role such agreements play in a country's development efforts.

Originally published: New York: The Macmillan Company, 1914. xi, 743 pp. Reprint of the second edition, which includes a new chapter on the income tax of 1913. Seligman argues persuasively that graduated income taxes distribute the burden of taxation with greater justice than other systems. After he sets out the fundamental problem of the concept of income taxation, Seligman enhances his theoretical argument with a historical examination of income taxes in Europe and the United States. With a useful index and a thorough bibliography.
Edwin R.A. Seligman 1861-1939] was an eminent economist and authority on tax issues. He was admitted to the New York State bar in 1884 and in the same year received an appointment as lecturer in the political science department at Columbia University, where he later became a professor of political economy and finance. Seligman was a cofounder of the American Economic Association, serving as Its president from 1902-1904, and was later president of the National Tax Association (1913-1915). He served as an adviser to New York State and New York City tax commissions and acted as consultant to the League of Nations (1922-1923) and the government of Cuba in 1931. He was the editor in chief of the Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences and editor of the Columbia University series Studies in History, Economics and Public Law. He was the author of numerous titles on taxation and economics including The Shifting and Incidence of Taxation (1892; 3rd ed., 1910), Progressive Taxation in Theory and Practice (1894; 2nd ed. 1908), Economic Interpretation of History (1902; 2nd ed. 1907), Principles of Economics (1907), Studies in Public Finance (1925) and Essays in Economics (1925).
"Professor Seligman's advocacy of the income tax in the various papers which were incorporated in this book] was an important factor in educating the American public to the point where the passage of the Sixteenth Amendment and of the law of 1913 was possible."
--5 Columbia Law Review (1915) 292

No study of Black people in America can be complete without considering how openly discriminatory tax laws helped establish a racial caste system in the United States, how they were designed to exclude blacks from lucrative markets and the voting franchise, and how tax laws extracted and redistributed vast sums of black wealth. Not only was slavery nearly a 100% tax on black labor, so too was Jim Crow apartheid and tax laws specified the peculiar institution as "negro slavery." The first instances of affirmative action in the United States were tax laws designed to attract white men to the South. The nineteenth-century Federal Tariff indirectly redistributed perhaps a majority of the profits from slavery from the South to the North and is the principle reason the Confederate states seceded. The only constitutional amendment obtained by the Civil Rights Movement is the Twenty-Sixth Amendment abolishing poll taxes in federal elections. Blending traditional legal theory, neoclassical economics, and a pan-African view of history, these six interrelated essays on race and taxes demonstrate that, even in today's supposedly post-racial society, there is no area of human activity where racial dynamics are absent.

Capital markets are a continuous stream of activity and innovation. Constantly evolving and inherently dynamic, they give rise to complex regulatory and policy issues and offer rich material for analysis. Additionally, globalization has incentivized cross-border listings and international flows of capital. Global Capital Markets takes stock of recent trends and events by exploring their legal and regulatory implications across several jurisdictions from around the world. This book provides a critical analysis of current issues including investor activism, the challenges of cross-border regulatory enforcement and recent initiatives to empower shareholders to improve corporate governance. It also surveys longer-term trends such as the development of the nascent capital markets law in China over the last two decades and discusses the emerging issues from the increased use of dual class voting shares. Case studies draw on examples from nations such as the US, Canada, Europe, China, India and New Zealand. Timely and incisive, this book will appeal to students and academics in international corporate and securities law. Contributors incude: A. Anand, Q. Bu, H. Donegan, T. Keeper, Y.-H. Lin, A.B Majumdar, C. Malberti, T. Rodriguez de las Heras Ballell, U. Varottil

This book is the only in-depth analysis of VAT to focus on exemptions as a whole. Ten insightful chapters - by economists, lawyers, legal academics, and government tax advisors from a wide variety of jurisdictions - grapple with the essential questions: Are VAT exemptions desirable? Are they avoidable? Are alternative legal designs possible? Are such alternatives necessary? What new problems do such designs give rise to? The authors emphasize in particular the design alternatives to exemptions that characterize 'modern' VAT and the newly proposed 'post-modern' VAT, both those that are already in operation in some countries and others that have not yet been attempted anywhere in the world. Among the core issues discussed are the following: 'out-of-scope' supplies and suppliers; merit or concessional exemptions for, e.g., charities, healthcare, cultural activities, and education services; and 'technical' exemptions applied to, e.g., gambling, immovable property, financial and insurance services.

The European Commission's proposed Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB) is the most ambitious project in the history of direct taxation within the EU. While retaining the right of Member States to set their own corporate tax rate, the proposed system allows for a 'one-stopshop' for filing tax returns and consolidating prof its and losses across the EU. In this book - the first to offer guidance to practitioners whose work will be affected by these new developments - 19 prominent representatives of the business community, tax consultancy, academic taxation scholarship and tax administration discuss the proposed system's rationale, structure and uncertainties, ranging from very technical aspects, to the wording of the proposal, to political considerations. These topics include the following: eligibility; formation of a group; the concept of 'permanent stablishment'; foreign tax credits; 'dual resident' companies; consequences of entering and leaving; depreciation of fixed assets; repackaged asset transfers; appeals procedure; disagreements among Member States; subsidiarity and the 'yellow card procedure'; international aspects and tax treaties; sharing mechanism and transfer pricing; and anti-abuse rules.

Despite the fact that business representatives need to be familiar with EU customs law and that authorities face hundreds of cases of remission and repayment on a daily basis, until now there has been no book explaining how these procedures work. There is also a need for detailed knowledge of the variety of situations with regard to remission and repayment which are not covered in the legislation but in the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union. This authoritative analysis by three leading practitioners in this complex area of law clearly describes what procedures to follow, what legislation to rely upon, and how to effectively invoke the case law on remission and repayment created by the Court of Justice. In great detail the authors explain the administrative procedure before the customs authorities and the European Commission, and also describe the possible judicial phase before national courts and the Court of Justice. They provide an overview of how the consolidated body of EU customs legislation and case law is interpreted in different EU countries, with in-depth focus on the particular remission and repayment procedures - from initial request to appeal - in three different jurisdictions. All of the following elements and much more are covered: * the current regulatory framework of the EU customs system; * definitions of importation and exportation under the Community Customs Code; * requirements for an application of remission and repayment; * difference between an appeal against the customs debt and remission and repayment; * examples of error of the customs authorities; * good faith of the operator; * examples of good faith in the remission and repayment context; * the concept of a 'special situation'; * remission or repayment of duty for goods rejected by the importer as defective; * preparation of the dossier by the national customs authority and its transmission to the European Commission; * appeals before the General Court of the European Union and Court of Justice of the European Union; * rights of defence in case of unfavourable decisions; and * the role of the European Ombudsman. The numerous lawyers, advisors, agents, and others who will greatly appreciate this book include EU and third-country trade lawyers and agents, compliance managers of export-import companies, officials of EU Member States and of international organizations dealing with customs issues, and traders and authorities of third countries that export goods to EU Member States. All will find here a constant resource that can be relied upon to answer virtually any pertinent question likely to arise.

The Cayman Islands is one of the world's leading jurisdictions for the establishment of offshore trusts. However, it is not easy for a practitioner to approach the drafting of a Cayman Islands trust instrument with confidence. This eminently practical book solves that problem to near perfection. Arranged as a collection of precedents, with each provision of every precedent explained in detail, "Drafting Cayman Islands Trusts", could hardly make the drafting process easier. The drafter learns the advantages and potential pitfalls associated with each provision as he or she prepares to draft it. The authors provide specific language, although individual variations (based on the authors' expert guidance) are encouraged. The precedents covered include the following: Discretionary trusts (with and without protectors); Interest in possession trust; Reserved powers trust; Charitable trust; STAR trusts; and, Appointments and retirements of trustees. For additional convenience, the precedents are also provided in Word format on a CD-ROM that comes with the book. The detailed annotation answers such key questions as the following: Are hostile beneficiaries clauses valid? Do automatic flee clauses work? What powers can a settlor reserve? How can STAR trusts be used to protect trustees holding high-risk assets? Would STAR trusts be recognised in other jurisdictions? How can one restrict a beneficiary's right to information and trust documents? Can the appointment of a foreign trustee discharge a retiring Cayman trustee? What indemnities should retiring trustees request from successors? As a systematic approach to drafting Cayman Islands trusts, this book will be of immeasurable day-to-day value to practitioners and administrators alike.