Martin Hearson

Putting a price on the reputation risk from tax avoidance

What are the reputational consequences of perceived corporate tax avoidance? That’s the question that introduces today’s “Tax and Reputation Forum,” organised by the Oxford Centre for Business Taxation and friends. (It’s at King’s College London, so after the High Court the other week, I’m beginning to think that Aldwych is the centre of tax news!)… Continue reading Putting a price on the reputation risk from tax avoidance

“Tax, Law and Development”: recommended reading for campaigners

This spring, two academic books have come out that offer an opportunity to look at tax and development from different perspectives. “Critical Issues in Taxation and Development” edited by Clemens Fuest and George Zodrow is going to be the economists’ take, using “modern empirical methods” to answer a lot of “what is the effect of… Continue reading “Tax, Law and Development”: recommended reading for campaigners

Why FATCA might be good for developing countries

Recently I wrote a post explaining that I feel cautious about the burden that compliance with an automatic tax information exchange standard would place on developing countries. Since then a new paper by Itai Grinberg has popped up called Emerging Countries and the Taxation of Offshore Accounts. This amused me. I encountered Grinberg a couple… Continue reading Why FATCA might be good for developing countries

Tax, law and morality: the IF campaign debate

Last night’s debate at St Martin’s in the Fields church, between politicians from what we used to call the three main parties, was quite interesting. Notable that all three were well aware of what the campaign is demanding, and after a bit of work I think we managed to tease some policy differences out of… Continue reading Tax, law and morality: the IF campaign debate

Secondments, democratic scrutiny and corporate tax

I’ve just been next door to the high court (a perk of being at the LSE!) to watch the UK Uncut Goldman Sachs judicial review. For all those who lament the quality of public debate on questions of corporate taxation, this is surely a desirable outcome: a painstaking debate through which the judiciary will decide… Continue reading Secondments, democratic scrutiny and corporate tax

Unitary taxation, Barclays and Africa

I just read the Tax Justice Network briefing which is explained in Richard Murphy’s blog title “Barclays and HSBC make the case for unitary tax in the UK – because we’d have collected £2.6 billion more in 4 years.” Now I haven’t checked out the UK figures at all, but the inclusion of Barclays piqued… Continue reading Unitary taxation, Barclays and Africa