求英文期刊文章“The VAT in developing and transitional countries”

求英文期刊文章“The VAT in developing and transitional countries”
或
What Do (and Don’t) We Know about the Value Added Tax?

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Value-Added Taxes in Developing and Transitional Countries: Lessons and Questions

1. Introduction

Few fiscal issues are more important in developing and transitional economies (DTE) than the value-added tax (VAT). Over the last few decades, VAT has swept the world. The principal reasons for the rapid spread of this form of taxation were, first, the early adoption of this form of taxation in the European Union (EU) and, second, the key role played in spreading the word to DTE by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in particular and by international agencies and advisors more generally. The success of VAT in the EU showed that VAT worked. The consistent support and advocacy of this form of taxation by the IMF and others in a variety of countries, first in Latin America, and then around the world, encouraged and facilitated the adoption of VAT by countries with much less developed economic and administrative structures than those in the original EU member states. At the same time, for various reasons of their own, all the non-EU countries of the OECD apart from the United States have also, one by one, introduced VATs, most recently Australia in 2000.
Of course, to a certain extent, as the background paper (ITD, 2005) observes, the VAT label covers a variety of taxes in different countries. Countries that belong to the EU have necessarily all adopted the same model of VAT, essentially as laid out by the Sixth Directive of 1977, although some important differences remain between VATs in EU member states (Mathias, 2004). Other countries influenced by the EU such as the recent and prospective ‘accession’ countries of central and eastern Europe have also largely followed this model. Elsewhere in the world, however, while the influence of the EU model (and some member-state variants) is clear in, for example, some former colonies of EU member states, other models have been developed and adopted, notably in New Zealand and Japan. Equally importantly, the IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department, the leading ‘change agent’ in this respect for in much of the world has over time evolved what is essentially its own ‘model’ of an appropriate VAT for DTE, as set out initially, for instance, in Tait (1988, 1991) and most recently in Ebrill et al. (2001). While VAT countries have introduced many local variations into whatever basic ‘model’ they may have started from, , as Victor Thuronyi (2003, p.312) has recently noted, “ while there are differences in VAT from one country to another, compared with the income tax VAT laws are remarkably similar.”
When DTE have a VAT, it is invariably among the most important sources of government revenue. Indeed, anyway one cares to look at it VAT has clearly been an enormous success. Not only has it swept the world almost clear of contending general sales taxes but in many DTE it dominates the income tax as the mainstay of national finances. No previous fiscal innovation has been adopted in such a wide variety of countries so rapidly.
Not all is sunshine in VATland, however. Clouds of varying sizes and shapes seem to be looming on the horizon in all VAT countries but perhaps particularly in DTE that have become increasingly dependent on VAT and hence more vulnerable to potential problems. Some of these problems have always been inherent in the structure and operation of VATs but are exacerbated by the increased fiscal weight being placed on the many DTE under pressure for new fiscal revenues for example to offset revenue losses from tariff reductions needed to accord with WTO requirements. It is thus perhaps time for a new look at the role of VAT in DTE.
Specifically, are the VATs now in place in most DTE as good as they could be in economic, equity, and administrative terms? Must ‘good’ VATs in such countries always follow the same pattern? Must every DTE have a VAT? Can all DTE administer a VAT sufficiently well to make the introduction of the tax worthwhile? Is a VAT always the best way to respond to the revenue problems arising from trade liberalization? Can VATs be adapted to cope with the rising demands in some countries, especially federal countries, for more access to revenues by local and regional governments? Can they deal with such new problems as those arising from changes in business practices with financial innovations and digital commerce? The answers to such questions are not only critical to the fiscal stability of many DTE but also to their economic growth and development. Are the VATs already in place in many DTE the efficient, simple, revenue-raisers some claim? Or, as others argue, are they so inequitable as to exacerbate social and political tensions? Does VAT provide a way to tap the informal sector or does it instead tend to expand that sector?
No brief paper can answer such complex questions, of course, so the objective of this paper is considerably more modest. Taking the background paper prepared for this conference (ITD, 2005) as its starting point, the aim of this paper is simply to provide a few additional reflections on some lessons that seem to emerge from experience to date with VAT in DTE – countries in which, for the most part, tax reality is much more dominated by administrative capacity on one hand and political necessity on the other than in the European home of so much VAT experience and thinking. There is indeed much room and need for sharing experiences between developed countries and DTE, but there are also some important differences that need to be explicitly taken into account when doing so. To paraphrase the conclusions of the late Jean Jacques Laffont (2004) in a recent survey of public utility regulation in DTE, not only do we as yet have surprisingly little solid empirical knowledge of some critical factors but the relevant economic theory also remains rather sketchy and we know even less about the relevant political economy context. For the most part, this paper simply attempts to flesh out these observations in a little more detail with respect to VAT in DTE. In doing so, it should perhaps be noted that although the points made are stated in general terms for the most part they are inevitably shaped by the author’s limited personal experience with various aspect of VATs in a number of DTE over the years. In a sense, however, this is perhaps not a limitation since it is precisely through closer analysis of, and reflection on, the experience of such case studies that we can best discern the real challenges facing VAT in DTE and the questions that most need further attention. Such at least, is the approach taken here.

2. Lessons from Experience