Reports of Adam Michel
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New Opportunities 2021: Fiscal policy for the recovery
Governments have responded to the pandemic by implementing safety-net programs to support businesses and workers during lockdowns, leading to elevated deficits and rising debt levels. Many states will soon need to face the aftermath of these decisions, but not all fiscal responses are created equal. Countries that favor spending cuts ...
Higher digital taxes coming soon: A three-part saga
Global policy around digital taxation is headed toward higher and more complicated taxes. The OECD’s latest proposed framework would add a new set of complex regulations to the existing system. Meanwhile, several countries are unilaterally implementing their own digital services tax, which they may refuse to repeal even after the ...
Relevance beyond the crisis: Fiscal policy’s moment
The Covid-induced economic crisis has led policymakers to put in place large fiscal rescue packages including new spending, tax cuts and subsidies. Governments will now be tempted to spend more to boost the recovery. Soon, however, countries will have to pay for the debts they have rung up. Those that ...
Opinion: The OECD heads down the wrong path
When it was first founded, the OECD’s mission was to support economic growth. It promoted free trade, low taxes and economic freedom. But over the last three decades, it has strayed from its original goals. It now focuses on expanding the reach of its member governments, especially when it comes ...
Taxing the digital economy
An ongoing international effort to rewrite the global tax rules for the digital economy would be a dramatic shift with potentially damaging consequences. Fear of countries unilaterally levying their own digital taxes has led to an alternative at the OECD, motivated by both fiscal and political factors. The new proposal would ...
Looking for the best tax code
Ballooning modern governments collect an increasing proportion of their countries’ output in taxes, which spreads inefficiency and economic stagnation. The drivers of this process can be neutralized, and the economy-distorting impact of taxation mitigated, with better tax-system design. Among OECD member states, there are examples of sound solutions to emulate.
FATCA’s dragnet tax compliance has high costs
The U.S. remains one of just a few countries that claim taxing rights on labor income earned abroad. Doing so has likely not raised net revenue, and the price tag for implementation and compliance outstrips even the rosiest revenue projections. Maintaining the system is detrimental to the U.S. economy and ...
Big government means high taxes
There is a growing myth that the rich are not paying their fair share in taxes and that the middle class is therefore overtaxed. This is not the case. High-income taxpayers across the OECD pay more than their share of the national income. The blame for heavy tax burdens in ...
