Taxation-State and Local Commons^™

State Digital Services Taxes: A Good And Permissible Idea (Despite What You Might Have Heard), Young Ran (Christine) Kim, Darien Shanske

Articles

Tax systems have been struggling to adapt to the digitalization of the economy. At the center of the struggles is taxing digital platforms, such as Google or Facebook. These immensely profitable firms have a business model that gives away “free” services, such as searching the web. The service is not really free; it is paid for by having the users watch ads and tender data. Traditional tax systems are not designed to tax such barter transactions, leaving a gap in taxation.

One response, pioneered in Europe, has been the creation of a wholly new tax to target digital platforms: the …

Tax Cannibalization And Fiscal Federalism In The United States, David Gamage, Darien Shanske

Articles by Maurer Faculty

We began this project pondering a riddle. Most state governments have adopted what we-and many others-view as clearly suboptimal tax policies, especially in regard to the taxation of corporate income and capital gains. Yet, with the notable exception of those who oppose progressivity and the taxation of capital, state-level tax policymakers have had remarkably little appetite for reform.

This Article provides one major explanation for this riddle by identifying and demonstrating a phenomenon that we label as "tax cannibalization." We argue that flawed state-level tax policies derive in part from perverse incentives inadvertently created by the federal government.

The Federal Government's Power To Restrict State Taxation, David Gamage, Darien Shanske

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This essay evaluates the limits on the U.S. federal government’s powers to restrict the taxing powers of state governments. The essay revisits earlier debates on this question, to consider the implications of the Supreme Court’s decision in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius and also academic research on the problem of tax cannibalization.

Tax Cannibalization And State Government Tax Incentive Programs, David Gamage, Darien Shanske

Articles by Maurer Faculty

States and localities offer businesses an enormous amount of tax incentives to locate within their jurisdictions despite: 1) the mass of evidence that suggests that these incentives are not particularly effective and, 2) substantial doubts about their constitutionality.

In this essay, we develop a new critical perspective on state tax incentives. We argue that offering these incentives permits states to offer lower taxes to more mobile businesses while keeping their overall corporate tax rates high. This is arguably not the best choice for the states, but it is definitely not the best choice for the federal government. Because the states …

Fiscal Federalism As Risk-Sharing: The Insurance Role Of Redistributive Taxation, John R. Brooks

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In addition to funding government and redistributing income, a redistributive tax-and-transfer system, and a progressive income tax in particular, provides insurance against the risk of uncertain future income. By providing for high taxes for high incomes, and low taxes, exemptions, and transfers for low incomes, a progressive income tax lowers the volatility of potential after-tax income relative to a lump-sum tax. This insurance function is distinct from the redistributive function of the system, since it provides a direct risk-mitigation benefit to the taxpayer himself, rather than simply redistributing income from one taxpayer to another.

This article analyzes the question of …

Fiscal Federalism In Chinese Taxation, Wei Cui

Wei Cui

The legal debate about the decentralization of taxing power in China has mainly centered around a directive issued by the State Council at the end of 1993, which directive, at the same time as launching the well-known and widely-discussed tax reform of 1994, announced that legislative power regarding taxation would be reserved exclusively for the central government. This directive has no constitutional basis, and its subsequent statutory incarnations are all either incomplete or ambiguous. Moreover, in the adoption of tax regulations for many types of taxes, there have been numerous deviations from this principle of centralization, and the bearing of …

Introduction To Comparative Fiscal Federalism: Comparing The European Court Of Justice And The Us Supreme Court's Tax Jurisprudence, James R. Hines Jr.

Other Publications

This volume brings together scholars from both sides of the Atlantic to consider federalist tax jurisprudence as practiced in Europe and the United States. These essays display a broad range of shared concerns, which is not to say that the scholars agree on all points of substantive policy and interpretation. What can be said is that there is general agreement that the exercise of comparing the tax jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice and the US Supreme Court is likely to be informative and beneficial to all concerned.

Designing Interstate Institutions: The Example Of The Ssuta, Brian D. Galle

ExpressO

This Article presents a case study in designing cooperative interstate institutions. It takes as its subject the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement (“SSUTA”), a recently-developed compact among the States now awaiting congressional ratification. The SSUTA’s primary goal is to bring uniformity to the field of state and local sales taxation, a regime in which multi-jurisdictional sellers now confront literally thousands of different sets of rules. I predict here that the SSUTA as currently designed is unlikely to accomplish that goal, and attempt to suggest possible amendments that could improve its expected performance. From these efforts I extract larger lessons …