Tassazione internazionale delle societ

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Tassazione internazionale delle società - PARTE I
ClamepEconomia della tassazione
societariaClamed4 crediti 30
ore28.9.2009-30.10.2009
LEZIONE 5 Modelli alternativi di imposizione
societaria
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Diverse forme di imposizione del reddito di
impresa

• Base imponibile
• Rendimento lordo sul capitale proprio (equity)
• Rendimento lordo sul capitale complessivo (debt
  equity)
• Solo rendite (rendimento in eccesso a quello
  normale)

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(No Transcript)
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1. Imposta tradizionale sui profitti alla fonte

• La base è definita sottraendo ai ricavi netti
  (net cash flow from real transactions,
  excluding net capital spending, i.e. sales of
  goods and services minus purchases of goods and
  services minus labour costs) lammortamento e gli
  interessi passivi
• d indica variabili relative a economia interna
• f indica variabili relative a economia estera
• Il reddito estero è escluso dalla base
  imponibile.
• Lo stesso risultato (imposta alla fonte) vale nel
  sistema 2 (imposta basata sulla residenza, per le
  società), se il profitto non è reimpatriato o se
  cè excess credit.
• Sistema solitamente molto distorsivo
• debt vs equity
• allocazione internazionale
• forma organizzativa
• politica dei dividendi

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Imposta sugli azionisti alla residenza

• Piena imputazione in capo allazionista
  (residente) di tutti i redditi, alla maturazione
• Solo lazionista è colui che ha capacità
  contributiva
• Neutrale rispetto a diverse forme organizzative e
  fonti di finanziamento
• Ma
• Difficile da applicare
• Possibili problemi di liquidità e informativi
• Se tassazione utili non distribuiti è alla
  realizzazione (per difficoltà di tassare alla
  maturazione), si apre varco elusivo (non ci
  sarebbe CT alla fonte, in questo sistema)
• Poco realistica

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Imposta sulle società alla residenza

• Il credito dovrebbe essere senza limitazioni
  (versione pura opzione 2 della tavola)
• Anche con credito limitato la abolizione del
  deferral (la tassazione avviene indipendentemente
  dal fatto che il reddito sia reimpatriato)
  avrebbe comunque leffetto di disincentivare gli
  investimenti nei paesi a bassa aliquota
• Ma
• Difficile da applicare
• Società MN (e loro capogrupo) sono mobili (sposto
  la residenza capogruppo nei paesi a tassazione
  inferiore)
• Poco realistica

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Imposte sulla residenza

• The notion of residence-based corporation tax
  which we aim to discuss here, though, is one that
  taxes the worldwide earnings of the multinational
  as it accrues, rather than as it is repatriated
  to the parent company. As with a residence-based
  shareholder tax, taxing only repatriations may
  generate a strong incentive for the company to
  reinvest abroad, without returning retained
  earnings to the parent. Even when countries
  attempt to implement a tax on repatriations, they
  typically give credit for taxes paid abroad.
  There are various ways of giving such credit, but
  the net effect is that skilled tax managers can
  arrange the groups financial affairs to prevent
  significant liabilities to such home country tax.
  Thus, application of the residence principle to
  corporations, in practice, bears a strong
  resemblance to source-based taxation. (Auerbach
  et al. 2008)

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Tassazione sulle rendite cash flow alla fonte

• Gli investimenti (I) interni sono immediatamente
  deducibili
• non lo è invece il costo finanziario
• METR 0 (neutrale rispetto a scala I)
• Due tipi di Cash FlowR, RF, S base
• Aspetto internazionale
• Se tassazione alla fonte base imponibile cash
  flow derivante da vendite allinterno o
  allestero al netto beni intermedi interni o
  importati, inclusi gli acquisti di beni capitali
  e al netto dei costi del lavoro (vedi definizione
  di R)
• AETRgt0 vi è distorsione nelle scelte di
  localizzazione se le rendite sono mobili

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Diverse tipologie di cash flow tax

• Si mantiene il principio di derivazione della BI
  dal bilancio
• Si considerano IAS/ IRFS un buon punto di
  partenza, ma non tutti li adottano
• Proposta di base comune non individuerà, dati i
  diversi punti di partenza (criteri contabili) gli
  aggiustamenti necessari (il quadro di raccordo).

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• Table 2 provides a simple outline of the R, RF
  and S bases. Under these bases, taxing only rent
  is achieved by allowing all expenses to be
  deduced from taxable profits as they are
  incurred, essentially taxing positive (inward)
  and (negative) outward cash flows at the same
  rate. In practice, as outlined below for the UK
  system, many corporate tax systems do tax the
  normal return to capital in addition to economic
  rent, thus affecting the cost of capital and
  potentially introducing distortions in firms
  choices over different forms of finance.
• .. Under the R base, no distinction is made
  between debt and equity. Regardless of how funds
  are raised, there are no taxes on the flows
  between businesses and their investors. Thus,
  businesses may choose among debt, equity and
  hybrid securities without consideration of the
  tax consequences. Under the RF base, however, a
  timing distinction would remain between debt and
  equity, with equity being ignored by the tax
  system and debt being provided an effective
  marginal tax rate of zero through offsetting
  taxes on borrowing and interest and principal
  repayments. ..

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• .The R base would seem a preferable policy to
  the RF base from this perspective but. Under
  the R base, financial proceeds and expenses are
  ignored, so that firms providing the same
  customers with both real and financial products
  have an incentive to overstate the profits from
  financial services and understate the profits
  from real activities. A related problem concerns
  financial companies .
• The returns that financial companies earn from
  the spreads generated by financial intermediation
  are automatically picked up by the RF base but
  ignored under the R base.
• Innovation in finance thus favours the R-base
  version of the Meade reports company tax system,
  while the growing importance of companies that
  specialize or engage in providing financial
  services calls for the RF base.
• Which approach is to be preferred is discussed
  further below, but the benefits of either
  approach are clear in comparison to a system that
  attempts to maintain an even greater distinction
  between debt and equity..
• (Auerbach et. al. 2008)

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• A cash flow tax on the real and/or financial
  surplus of firms allows an immediate expensing of
  investment. Because the present value of the cash
  flows from a marginal investment is just equal to
  the initial investment outlay, the cash flow tax
  therefore leaves marginal investment projects
  free of tax, falling only on pure rents. In a
  closed economy this feature would ensure that a
  cash flow tax would be non-distortionary.
  However, in an open economy the rents earned by
  multinational companies often derive from
  firm-specific assets and may be generated in many
  alternative locations. When the fixed costs of
  doing business are so large that multinationals
  choose to serve several national markets from a
  single location rather than producing in all
  countries, a cash flow tax on internationally
  mobile rents will therefore affect the
  international location decisions of
  multinationals, even though it will not reduce
  the privately optimal scale of local investment
  once a company has decided to locate in a
  particular country. (Sorensen, 2007)

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• . a source-based flow-of-funds tax leaves some
  distortions in place, in particular with respect
  to two important location decisions. Companies
  making discrete location choices will normally
  consider alternative locations on the basis of a
  comparison of the post-tax net present value. In
  general this would be affected by a flow-of-funds
  tax. Also, the question of the location of the
  source of the profit is not resolved by a
  source-based flow-of-funds tax. Indeed, the
  incentives to shift profit may be greater under a
  flow-of-funds tax to the extent to which a
  revenue-neutral reform which introduced a
  flow-of-funds tax would require a higher
  statutory tax rate (this is discussed further
  below). In turn, this would create greater
  incentives for shifting profits between
  jurisdictions. It may also induce the most
  profitable firms to move abroad, leaving the
  domestic economy with the less profitable firms.
• (Auerbach et. al, 2008)

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• . Three further well-known problems should also
  be mentioned. The first concerns transition
  effects. If introduced without an appropriate
  phasing in period (which could be very long),
  then existing capital would be more heavily taxed
  than new investment. To some extent that might be
  regarded as efficient, if inequitable. However,
  treating competing companies unequally might
  introduce distortions to competition and hence
  welfare costs, for example, if companies face
  financial constraints on their activities.
  Second, the neutrality of the tax with respect to
  investment depends crucially on the tax rate
  being constant over time indeed, it requires
  that investors believe that the tax rate will not
  change in the future. If investors expect future
  returns to be taxed at a different rate than
  current investment is relieved, then marginal
  investments will be taxed (or subsidised).
  However, this is not only true for flow-of-funds
  taxes no realistic tax can be neutral with
  respect to the scale of investment if the tax
  rate is expected to fluctuate.
• Third, a pure flow-of-funds tax requires the tax
  to be symmetric tax payments must be negative
  when there are taxable losses. For a conventional
  investment, which involves initial capital
  expenditure, followed subsequently by a return,
  this implies that the initial investment is
  effectively subsidised. Governments are typically
  reluctant to provide such subsidies, especially
  through a general tax system - and with some
  reason, since they would enhance the possibility
  of fraud. The next form of tax we consider is
  designed to lessen this problem...
• (Auerbach et. al, 2008)

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• Such a tax will cut into all pure rents earned
  from domestic production. As long as the tax does
  not induce companies earning mobile rents to
  relocate their production, the source-based cash
  flow tax is a non distortionary means of shifting
  rents from foreigners to domestic residents (via
  the public budget). However, if the tax becomes
  too high, it will cause a shift of production out
  of the domestic economy. The stronger the local
  agglomeration forces and the better the local
  infrastructure, the greater is the element of
  location-specific rent in the total rent earned
  by companies, and the higher is the cash flow tax
  rate which may be sustained without deterring
  investors.
• Like the existing corporation tax, a
  source-based cash flow tax will give a tax
  incentive for multinationals to manipulate the
  transfer prices used in intra-company
  transactions. Indeed, compared to a traditional
  tax, at the same revenue, the statutory cash flow
  tax rate would be higher, giving greater
  incentive to shift profits away. (Sorensen, 2007)

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Tassazione sulle rendite cash flow alla
destinazione

• Gli investimenti (I) interni sono immediatamente
  deducibili
• non lo è invece il costo finanziario
• METR 0 (neutrale rispetto a scala I)
• neutrale rispetto alle scelte finanziarie
• Due tipi di Cash FlowR, RF base
• Aspetto internazionale
• Destinazione invece che origine dalla base
  imponibile tolgo i beni prodotti internamente e
  esportati (Sdf)e aggiungo quelli importati (Sfd)

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• The tax base is therefore equal to the current
  VAT base minus labour costs, assuming that the
  tax is levied on all firms, and not just on
  corporations. Because of the formal similarity
  with the VAT, it is possible that such a tax
  could get the status of an indirect tax
  consistent with current international tax law so
  that domestic tax could also be levied on the
  domestic sales of foreign-based firms. In that
  case the tax would not only fall on firms located
  in the domestic economy it would also fall on
  firms servicing the domestic market from abroad.
  This is one of the attractions of the destination
  base because the tax on sales to the domestic
  market cannot be avoided by moving production
  abroad, the system minimizes the incentive to
  relocate.
• Pure rents are taxed only to the extent that
  they are consumed by residents in the domestic
  jurisdiction. Hence the VAT-type cash flow tax
  will not distort the investment and location
  decisions of firms, but at the same time it will
  not enable the domestic government to capture any
  of the rents accruing to foreigners.
• A very attractive feature of the VAT-type
  destination-based cash flow tax is that it
  eliminates the transfer-pricing problem (X
  escluse, M incluse)
• Problemi di transizione.

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Imposta sul cash flow problemi

• Introducing a cash flow taxbe it
  destination-based or source-based could cause
  significant transition problems. For example,
  initially the tax will fall mostly on the cash
  flows from old investment and will have the
  character of an (unanticipated) capital levy.
  This could create liquidity problems for
  capital-intensive and heavily indebted companies,
  necessitating extensive grandfathering rules such
  as a continuation of depreciation allowances for
  old capital and continuation of deductions
  for interest on old debt. The more extensive
  the grandfathering, the smaller will be the
  efficiency gain from the cash flow tax.
• Unanticipated tax rate changes occurring after
  the introduction of the cash flow tax will also
  generate windfall losses or gains. Moreover, a
  fully anticipated tax rate change could seriously
  disrupt the timing of investment. For example, if
  firms expect a future increase in the cash flow
  tax rate, they will postpone their investment to
  be able to deduct the investment expenditure
  against the higher future tax rate. Conversely,
  if they expect a future fall in the tax rate,
  firms will bring forward investment to take
  advantage of the expensing of investment against
  the higher current tax rate.
• Another problem is that countries operating a
  foreign tax credit system may not be willing to
  recognize a cash flow tax as a tax eligible for
  foreign tax credit.

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Tassazione sulle rendite lAllowance for
Corporate Equity (ACE)

• Si deduce il costo opportunità del capitale
  proprio
• E neutrale rispetto alle scelte di investimento
  (METR0) e finanziarie (debito e capitale proprio
  sono trattati uguali)
• Il tasso r non avrebbe bisogno di correzione per
  il rischio se il sistema riconoscesse full loss
  offset.
• Come nel caso dellimposta sul cash flow alla
  fonte, se il passaggio dallattuale tassazione
  sui profitti (sia normali che extraprofitti) ad
  una tassazione sulle rendite (extra profitti)
  comportasse un aumento dellaliquota, vi potrebbe
  essere un effetto negativo sulla localizzazione
  degli investimenti MN e sul profit shifting

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Tassazione delle rendite

• On the positive side, both the ACE and the cash
  flow taxes eliminate distortions due to
  deviations between true economic depreciation and
  depreciation for tax purposes, and both types of
  taxes are in principle neutral towards corporate
  financing decisions.
• On the negative side, by exempting normal returns
  from tax, rent taxes tend to require higher
  statutory tax rates to secure the desired
  revenue. This is likely to deter inward
  investment by highly profitable multinationals
  and to provoke outward profit-shifting through
  transfer-pricing.
• One important difference between the ACE and cash
  flow taxation is that anticipated tax rate
  changes may cause serious distortions to the
  timing of investment under the latter tax system,
  as we explained in the previous section.
  Introducing cash flow taxation is also likely to
  cause more significant transition problems. On
  the other hand, we noted that in practice it may
  be difficult to set the imputed cost of equity
  finance at the right level under the ACE.

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Tassazione dellintero rendimento del capitale
CBIT (Comprehensive Business Income Tax)

• Tutto il reddito, sia nella forma di utili
  (profitti normali ed extraprofitti), sia nella
  forma di interessi, viene tassato in capo alla
  società (PT0)
• Neutrale rispetto alle scelte finanziarie, ma non
  rispetto a scelte di investimento (METRgt0)
• Ampia base, consente bassa aliquota (riduce
  distorsioni e incentivo a profit shifting)
• Tassazione interessi alla fonte (evita che vadano
  non tassati adesso sono tassati solo in capo al
  percettore, sempre che sia possibile accertare il
  reddito..)
• Problemi di transizione tassazione interessi
  penalizza imprese molto indebitate e può
  disincentivare investimenti dallestero
  finanziati con debito.
• NB la ns IRAP assomiglia base ancora più ampia,
  in quanto include il costo del lavoro

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Confronto ACE e CBIT

• A parità gettito ACE comporta aliquota più alta
  (anche se occorre tenere conto di come variano
  PT)
• Per questo CBIT tenderebbe ad esser preferibile
  in economia aperta, ma
• è molto difficile la transizione, se
  laliquota è elevata. US Treasury che ha avanzato
  la proposta CBIT nel 1992, con aliquota uguale al
  30 (e abolizione PT), prevedeva un periodo di
  transizione di 10 anni!!!
• ACE e CBIT sono entrambi neutrali rispetto a
  scelte finanziarie.
• ACE tende ad essere più neutrale anche rispetto
  alle scelte di investimento (ma dipende dalla
  aliquota personale dellinvestitore marginale e
  con riferimento alla scala, non alla
  localizzazione dellinvestimento)
• CBIT è meno realistica soprattutto se la riforma
  viene effettuata da un solo paese (nessuno si è
  mai mosso verso CBIT pura, mentre verso ACE si)

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Tassazione duale del reddito di impresa (DIT -
Dual Income Tax)

• Aliquota uniforme sui redditi di capitale (td)
  uguale alla aliquota più bassa dellimposta sul
  reddito da lavoro (tp). Tassazione sul reddito da
  lavoro progressiva.
• I redditi di capitale sono calcolati prima e
  sono imputati (nozionali), analogamente al costo
  opportunità del capitale proprio (ci sono diverse
  varianti)
• Aliquota dellimposta societaria uguale alla
  aliquota sui redditi di capitale
• Versione pura interessi tassati in capo al
  percettore con la stessa aliquota td, mentre
  dividendi e plusvalenze derivanti da utili
  trattenuti e già tassati in capo alla società
  sono esenti (vedi versione Norvegese 1992-2005)

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DIT e CBIT

• A variant of the CBIT is the dual income tax,
  which is used in some Scandinavian countries. The
  basic idea of a dual income tax is to have a low
  tax rate on all capital income, while keeping a
  progressive labour income tax. If the dual income
  tax were imposed solely at the corporate level,
  then it would have exactly the same structure as
  the CBIT. However, the original proposals differ
  in the tax rate which they envisage on capital
  income. Tying the CBIT rate to the highest rate
  of personal income tax has the advantage of
  minimising distortions to organisational form
  businesses would be indifferent to paying income
  tax or a CBIT corporation tax. However, a high
  tax rate is likely to discourage inward flows of
  capital and profit. By contrast, proponents of
  the dual income tax point to the need to
  encourage inward international capital flows as
  areason for keeping a low tax rate on capital
  income. In a pure version of the system, the
  corporate income tax rate is matched to the
  lowest marginal personal income tax rate so that
  only labour income above a certain level is taxed
  at a higher rate. That though, raises the problem
  of distortions to organisational form an
  owner-manager would rather take his return in the
  form of capital income than labour income.
  (Although this problem is not unique to the dual
  income tax it applies whenever capital income
  and labour income are taxed at different rates).

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DIT e CBIT

• A further difference from the CBIT is an
  important distinction in implementation. Instead
  of levying a single tax rate on all corporate
  income, dual income taxes tend to give relief for
  interest paid at the corporate level, as with a
  conventional corporation tax, and instead tax it
  at the personal level, possibly using a
  withholding tax, typically set at a lower for
  non-residents. However, this means that interest
  paid to non-residents is typically taxed at a
  lower rate than interest paid to residents. That
  reintroduces a distinction between debt and
  equity which is avoided under the CBIT. (Auerbach
  et al. 2008)

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• The Dual Income Tax (DIT) imposes a low flat
  uniform tax rate on all income from capital
  (including corporate income) and applies a
  progressive tax schedule to labour income. In the
  pureversion of the system, the tax rate in the
  lowest bracket of the schedule for labour income
  is aligned with the capital income tax rate so
  that only labour income above a certain level is
  taxed at a higher rate. Thus the DIT may also be
  described as a combination of a proportional tax
  on all income and a progressive surtax on high
  labour income. The flatness and uniformity of the
  capital income tax may be seen as an attempt to
  achieve the greatest possible degree of
  neutrality in a tax system that attempts to tax
  the full return to capital.
• An interesting version of the DIT was the tax
  system prevailing in Norway from 1992 until the
  end of 2005. Under this system the double
  taxation of corporate source equity income was
  fully alleviated. For dividends this was done
  through an imputation system, and for capital
  gains it was achieved through the so-called RISK
  system which allowed the shareholder to write up
  the basis of his shares with (his proportionate
  amount of) the retained profit which had already
  been subjected to corporation tax. Thus the
  personal capital gains tax was imposed only on
  (realized) income that had not already been taxed
  at the corporate level.

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Problemi della DIT versione Nordica

• Convenienza a trasformare reddito di lavoro in
  reddito di capitale
• Divisione fra il reddito di lavoro e quello di
  capitale nelle attività dove entrambi i fattori
  concorrono a formare il reddito, es società di
  persone (il reddito di capitale è definito prima)
• Convenienza a trasformare società di persone in
  società di capitale (introduzione di diverse
  regole e norme antielusive, es estensione del
  sistema di divisione del reddito anche alle
  società di capitali a ristretta base azionaria.)
• Tallone dAchille della riforma!

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• However, since labour income is taxed more
  heavily than income from capital, a DIT gives the
  taxpayer an incentive to relabel his labour
  income as capital income. This option is mainly
  open to (controlling) owners of small firms who
  work in their own business.
• To prevent such income shifting, the previous
  Norwegian tax rules required that the income of
  the self-employed and of active owners of
  corporations be split into a capital income
  component and a labour income component.
• The capital income component was calculated as an
  imputed return on the value of the business
  assets in the firms tax accounts.
• The residual business profit was then taxed as
  labour inome (up to a certain ceiling beyond
  which the profit was again categorized as capital
  income).

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DIT versione Norvegese (fino a 2005)

• Under the Norwegian tax rules prevailing until
  the end of 2005, a shareholder was deemed to be
  active and hence liable to income splitting
  if he carried out some minimum amount of work in
  the company and controlled at least two-thirds of
  the shares (alone or together with his closest
  relatives). However, by inviting passive
  owners into the company, many Norwegian
  owner-managers were able to avoid mandatory
  income splitting and to have all of their income
  taxed at the low capital income tax rate even
  when a substantial part of the income was in fact
  labour income. Indeed, the number of small
  companies subject to mandatory income splitting
  was steadily falling since the introduction of
  the DIT in 1992, so this part of the Norwegian
  tax system turned out to be its Achilles heel.

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DIT versione Norvegese (riforma 2006)

• Si applica una imposta alla residenza sugli
  azionisti sulla quota di dividendi che eccede il
  rendimento normale. In sostanza, si tassano gli
  extra profitti in capo allazionista.
• Laliquota sugli azionisti è uguale a quella sui
  redditi di capitali e sommata a quella già
  prelevata in capo alla società coincide circa con
  laliquota massima dellimposta personale sui
  redditi di lavoro.
• In sostanza, il rendimento normale è tassato una
  sola volta in capo alla società con td, come gli
  interessi (in capo al percettore).
  Lextraprofitto è tassato due volte (in capo alla
  società e in capo al socio) in modo che aliquota
  complessiva è circa a tp
• Così non vi è più convenienza a trasformare
  reddito di lavoro in reddito di capitale
• Italia ha avuto sistema analogo (1997-2001), ma
  con tassazione extraprofitti in capo alla società

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• The reform replaced the problematic income
  splitting system for active shareholders by a
  so-called shareholder income tax (in Norwegian
  aksjonærmodellen). This is a personal
  residence-based tax levied on that part of the
  taxpayers realized income from shares (dividends
  plus realized capital gains) which exceeds an
  imputed after-tax rate of interest on the basis
  of his shares. Shareholder income in excess of
  the imputed normal return is taxed as ordinary
  capital income. At the margin, the total
  corporate and personal tax burden on corporate
  equity income is roughly equal to the top
  marginal tax rate on labour income. Hence
  corporate owner-managers can gain nothing by
  transforming labour income into dividends and
  capital gains, and consequently the mandatory
  income splitting system for active shareholders
  has been abolished.
• To avoid discrimination against investment in
  foreign shares, the rateof- return allowance
  (RRA) under the shareholder income tax is granted
  to holders of foreign as well as Norwegian shares.

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• To illustrate the mechanics of the Norwegian
  shareholder income tax in the simplest possible
  manner, suppose that the company does not earn
  any income from foreign sources and that all
  after-tax corporate profits are paid out as
  dividends. Suppose further that the value of the
  shares to which a return is imputed equals the
  equity Kd Bd of the company and that the flat
  personal tax rate on capital income equals the
  corporate income tax rate td, in line with
  Norwegian tax law. The personal shareholder
  income tax Tpd is payable by a domestic
  shareholder is then given by.

Rendimento normale reddito di capitale imputato
Dividendi
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Confronto fra regimi alternativi

• Difficile, soprattutto se la scelta è
  unilaterale
• Auerbach et al. (2008) a favore CFT alla
  destinazione
• Given the difficulties in implementing taxes on a
  source or residence basis which are both feasible
  and non-distorting, it is worth considering
  whether a tax on corporate income could be levied
  on a destination basis. If that were possible
  then the tax would avoid distorting the location
  of capital and profit.
• Griffith et al. (2008) a favore ACE alla fonte
• As far as the taxation of business income is
  concerned, we argue for a source-based tax which
  exempts the normal return from tax. This can be
  implemented by allowing firms to deduct an
  imputed normal return to their equity, just as
  they are currently allowed to deduct the interest
  on their debtsOur proposal for a UK dual income
  tax assumes that the UK government will wish to
  continue levying some personal tax on the normal
  return to capital.

35
CFT alla destinazione proprietà e problemi

• A destination-based cash flow tax would thus
  have desirable properties the scale and location
  of investment, and the use of different forms of
  finance, would all be unaffected by the tax.
  There would also be no incentive to shift profits
  to low tax-rate jurisdictions, an advantage which
  applies even if the above conditions for
  equivalence hold. Offsetting this is the
  underlying need for the source country to give
  relief for the cost of labour, even if the final
  good is exported and hence not taxed in that
  jurisdiction.
• A characteristic of the destination-based
  corporate cash-flow tax is that it relinquishes
  the claim to domestic location-specific
  production rents. By imposing a tax based on
  destination, a country forgoes any attempt to tax
  rents that accrue to companies as a result of
  operating in its jurisdiction (source-based
  rents) as well as rents that might accrue as the
  result of residence. The corporate cash-flow tax,
  like a VAT, is a tax on domestic consumption.
  (Since labour income is not taxed, it differs
  from VAT in being a tax on domestic consumption
  from non-labour income.) It therefore imposes no
  burden on the consumption of those abroad who
  benefit from local rents.
• A potential problems with implementing this
  proposal arise in transition.
• A further question is whether destination-based
  flow of funds tax would be creditable against any
  tax levied by a capital-exporting country.
  (Auerbach et al. 2008)

36
CFT alla destinazione proprietà e problemi

• Moving from predominantly source-based corporate
  taxation to residence-based taxation is not an
  attractive option. Taxing corporate income in the
  hands of the parent company is in any case more
  like source-based taxation, since the location of
  the parent is not fixed. So true residence-based
  taxation would have to be at the level of the
  individual investor but in a globalised world,
  this is scarcely feasible.
• An alternative which we have put forward for
  serious consideration is a destinationbased tax,
  levied where a sale to a final consumer is made.
  In fact, we formulate a simple though
  far-reaching - extension of the flow-of-funds
  taxes of Meade. Specifically, we suggest that one
  might improve on Meades proposed taxes by adding
  border adjustments imports would be taxed, but
  tax on exports would be refunded.
• The result is a destination-based cash-flow tax,
  essentially a destination-based VAT, but with
  labour costs deductible. We believe that there is
  a good case for implementing such a tax on an RF
  basis, rather than on an R-basis, on the grounds
  that this would also tax the economic rents
  generated by banks on lending to domestic
  borrowers. (Auerbach et al. 2008)

37
ACE alla fonte proprietà e problemi

• The theoretical case for an ACE in an open
  economy context follows from the analysis in
  section 3.2. In that section we saw that, in a
  small open economy with near-perfect capital
  mobility, the burden of a source-based tax on the
  normal return to capital will tend to be fully
  shifted onto the less mobile domestic factors of
  production such as labour and land. Indeed, the
  domestic factors end up bearing more than the
  full burden of the source tax on capital, since
  the capital outflow generated by the tax reduces
  the productivity of (and hence the pre-tax return
  to) domestic production factors.
• The owners of these factors would therefore be
  better off if they paid the tax directly, since
  this would prevent the capital flight. It is
  sometimes argued that since an ACE erodes the
  corporate income tax base, it creates a need for
  a higher statutory corporate tax rate which may
  induce multinationals earning mobile rents to
  flee the country so that domestic immobile
  factors will lose out anyway (see, e.g., Bond
  (2000)).

38
ACE alla fonte proprietà e problemi

• However, since the owners of domestic factors
  already effectively pay the source tax on the
  normal return to corporate capital, there is no
  rationale for raising the statutory corporate tax
  rate to make up for the revenue loss from the
  introduction of an ACE. In the long term the
  abolition of the source tax on the normal return
  and the resulting stimulus to domestic and
  inbound investment will raise the pre-tax return
  to domestic immobile factors by more than the
  revenue loss from the ACE, so even if all of the
  lost revenue were recouped through higher taxes
  on these factors, their owners will still end up
  with higher net incomes than before. For this
  reason, and because of the opportunities for
  international income shifting through transfer
  pricing, we propose that the introduction of an
  ACE should not be accompanied by a rise in the
  statutory corporate income tax rate.

39
ACE alla fonte proprietà e problemi

• Apart from promoting domestic investment, the ACE
  has several other attractive features. One of
  them - originally pointed out by Boadway and
  Bruce (1984) - is that it offsets the investment
  distortions caused by deviations between true
  economic depreciation and depreciation for
  taxpurposes. If firms write down their assets at
  an accelerated pace, the current tax saving from
  accelerated depreciation will be offset by a fall
  in future rate-of-return allowances of equal
  present value, since accelerated depreciation
  reduces the book value of the assets to which
  future rates of return are imputed. In fact,
  regardless of the rate at which firms write down
  their assets in the tax accounts, the present
  value of the sum of the capital allowance and the
  ACE allowance will always equal the initial
  investment outlay, so the ACE system is
  equivalent to the immediate expensing of
  investment allowed under a cash flow tax (see Box
  1).

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41
ACE alla fonte proprietà e problemi

• Another attraction of the ACE is that the
  symmetric treatment of debt and equity eliminates
  the need for thin capitalisation rules to protect
  the domestic tax base since firms get a
  deduction for an imputed interest on their equity
  as well as for the interest on their debt,
  multinationals have no incentive to
  undercapitalise a subsidiary operating in a
  country with an ACE system. More generally, the
  ACE would solve the increasingly difficult
  problem of distinguishing between debt and equity
  for tax purposes. As explained in the chapter on
  the corporate income tax, financial innovations
  in recent decades have produced new financial
  debt instruments allowing firms to take
  advantage of interest deductibility even though
  these instruments are in many ways equivalent to
  equity. Under an ACE system the base for the ACE
  allowance would be determined by a simple
  criterion that does not require the tax
  authorities to evaluate whether any given
  corporate liability is truly debt or equity.
  Under this criterion the ACE allowance would be
  imputed only to those liabilities on the company
  balance sheet to which no interest deduction is
  attached.

42
ACE alla fonte proprietà e problemi

• The neutrality properties of the ACE system will
  depend on whether the imputed rate of return on
  equity is set at the right level. In principle
  it is not necessary to include a risk premium in
  the imputed rate of return, provided the tax
  reduction stemming from the ACE allowance is a
  safe cash flow from the viewpoint of the firm
  (see Bond and Devereux (1995)). This requires
  full loss offsets, including unlimited
  carry-forward of losses with interest. With
  limitations on loss offsets, the imputed return
  should include a risk premium, but in practice
  the tax authorities would not have the
  firm-specific information necessary to choose the
  correct risk premium. A practical solution
  might be to set the imputed rate of return equal
  to the average interest rate on UK corporate
  bonds, even if this would involve some sacrifice
  of tax neutrality (see Box 2).

43
ACE alla fonte

• ACE suggerita da Griffith et al. (2008) molto
  simile a ipotesi riforma Commissione Biasco
  (2007)
• Solo incrementale (nuovi apporti di capitale e
  utili trattenuti)
• An important issue is how to calculate the
  initial equity base at the time of introduction
  of the ACE system. To minimise the revenue loss
  and to prevent windfall gains to the owners of
  old capital already installed, we propose that
  the initial equity base be set equal to zero for
  tax purposes so that the ACE allowance would be
  granted only for additions to the equity base
  undertaken after the time of reform.
• Come anche ns vecchia Dit!!!
• Aliquota zero su remunerazione ordinaria
  (rendimento normale, in capo alla società)