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A border-adjustment tax (also known as a border-adjusted tax, destination tax, destination-based cash flow tax or a border tax adjustment) is a tax on goods based on location of final consumption rather than production. [1] It allegedly eliminates incentives for companies to reduce their tax bills through tax inversion and intangible asset relocation. [2] [3] [4]
The concept of a border-adjustment tax was originally the subject of a 1997 article by economist Alan J. Auerbach. [5] Auerbach worked with Michael Devereux, who had introduced with Stephen R. Bond, the term destination-based corporate tax. Auerbach described a system that he claimed would align business incentives with the national interest. [2]
While it may appear that this would increase consumer prices, Auerbach's theory holds that a border-adjustment tax would strengthen the domestic currency by a proportion corresponding to the tax rate. The stronger domestic currency would effectively reduce the price of imported goods, effectively cancelling out the higher tax on imports.[ citation needed ]
In theory, a border-adjustment tax is trade neutral: the stronger domestic currency would make exports more expensive internationally, lowering demand for exported products while reducing the costs incurred by domestic firms in purchasing goods and services in foreign markets, helping importers. Thus, the anticipated strengthening of the domestic currency effectively neutralizes the border-adjustment tax, resulting in a trade-neutral outcome. However other studies indicate that currency adjustments may not always flow through to price adjustments, shifting the incidence of the tax to consumers and/or producers. [6]
In the United States, the Republican Party in 2016 included most of Auerbach's recommendations in their policy paper "A Better Way — Our Vision for a Confident America", [7] which promoted a move to "a destination-basis tax system." [8] :27 [9] As of February 2017, the proposal was the subject of heated debate - with Gary Cohn, Director of the National Economic Council opposing it [10] and the Koch brothers-funded Americans for Prosperity (AFP) lobby group, unveiling their plan to fight the tax. [11]
The balance of trade, commercial balance, or net exports, is the difference between the monetary value of a nation's exports and imports over a certain time period. Sometimes a distinction is made between a balance of trade for goods versus one for services. The balance of trade measures a flow of exports and imports over a given period of time. The notion of the balance of trade does not mean that exports and imports are "in balance" with each other.
The economy of Egypt was a highly centralized economy focused on import substitution under president Gamal Abdel Nasser (1954-1970). In the 1990s, a series of International Monetary Fund arrangements, coupled with massive external debt relief resulting from Egypt's participation in the Gulf War coalition, helped Egypt improve its macroeconomic performance.
International trade is the exchange of capital, goods, and services across international borders or territories because there is a need or want of goods or services.
The economy of Kyrgyzstan is heavily dependent on the agricultural sector. Cotton, tobacco, wool, and meat are the main agricultural products, although only tobacco and cotton are exported in any quantity. According to Healy Consultants, Kyrgyzstan's economy relies heavily on the strength of industrial exports, with plentiful reserves of gold, mercury and uranium. The economy also relies heavily on remittances from foreign workers. Following independence, Kyrgyzstan was progressive in carrying out market reforms, such as an improved regulatory system and land reform. In 1998, Kyrgyzstan was the first Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) country to be accepted into the World Trade Organization. Much of the government's stock in enterprises has been sold. Kyrgyzstan's economic performance has been hindered by widespread corruption, low foreign investment and general regional instability. Despite political corruption and regional instability, Kyrgyzstan is ranked 70th on the ease of doing business index.
A tariff is a tax imposed by a government on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and policy that taxes foreign products to encourage or safeguard domestic industry. Tariffs are among the most widely used instruments of protectionism, along with import and export quotas.
In economics and political science, fiscal policy is the use of government revenue collection and expenditure (spending) to influence a country's economy. The use of government revenues and expenditures to influence macroeconomic variables developed as a result of the Great Depression, when the previous laissez-faire approach to economic management became unpopular. Fiscal policy is based on the theories of the British economist John Maynard Keynes, whose Keynesian economics theorized that government changes in the levels of taxation and government spending influences aggregate demand and the level of economic activity. Fiscal and monetary policy are the key strategies used by a country's government and central bank to advance its economic objectives. The combination of these policies enables these authorities to target inflation and to increase employment. Additionally, it is designed to try to keep GDP growth at 2%–3% and the unemployment rate near the natural unemployment rate of 4%–5%. This implies that fiscal policy is used to stabilize the economy over the course of the business cycle.
In finance, an exchange rate is the rate at which one currency will be exchanged for another. It is also regarded as the value of one country's currency in relation to another currency. For example, an interbank exchange rate of 114 Japanese yen to the United States dollar means that ¥114 will be exchanged for US$1 or that US$1 will be exchanged for ¥114. In this case it is said that the price of a dollar in relation to yen is ¥114, or equivalently that the price of a yen in relation to dollars is $1/114.
An export in international trade is a good or service produced in one country that is sold into another country. The seller of such goods and services is an exporter; the foreign buyer is an importer.
FairTax was a single rate tax proposal in 2005, 2008 and 2009 in the United States that includes complete dismantling of the Internal Revenue Service. The proposal would eliminate all federal income taxes, payroll taxes, gift taxes, and estate taxes, replacing them with a single consumption tax on retail sales.
In macroeconomics and modern monetary policy, a devaluation is an official lowering of the value of a country's currency within a fixed exchange-rate system, in which a monetary authority formally sets a lower exchange rate of the national currency in relation to a foreign reference currency or currency basket. The opposite of devaluation, a change in the exchange rate making the domestic currency more expensive, is called a revaluation. A monetary authority maintains a fixed value of its currency by being ready to buy or sell foreign currency with the domestic currency at a stated rate; a devaluation is an indication that the monetary authority will buy and sell foreign currency at a lower rate.
The Sugar Act 1764, also known as the American Revenue Act 1764 or the American Duties Act, was a revenue-raising act passed by the Parliament of Great Britain on 5 April 1764. The preamble to the act stated: "it is expedient that new provisions and regulations should be established for improving the revenue of this Kingdom ... and ... it is just and necessary that a revenue should be raised ... for defraying the expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the same." The earlier Molasses Act 1733, which had imposed a tax of six pence per gallon of molasses, had never been effectively collected due to colonial evasion. By reducing the rate by half and increasing measures to enforce the tax, the British hoped that the tax would actually be collected. These incidents increased the colonists' concerns about the intent of the British Parliament and helped the growing movement that became the American Revolution.
International economics is concerned with the effects upon economic activity from international differences in productive resources and consumer preferences and the international institutions that affect them. It seeks to explain the patterns and consequences of transactions and interactions between the inhabitants of different countries, including trade, investment and transaction.
Duty-free shops are retail outlets whose goods are exempt from the payment of certain local or national taxes and duties, on the requirement that the goods sold will be sold to travelers who will take them out of the country. Which products can be sold duty-free vary by jurisdiction, as well as how they can be sold, and the process of calculating the duty or refunding the duty component.
The price–specie flow mechanism is a model developed by Scottish economist David Hume (1711–1776) to illustrate how trade imbalances can self-correct and adjust under the gold standard. Hume expounded his argument in Of the Balance of Trade, which he wrote to counter the Mercantilist idea that a nation should strive for a positive balance of trade. In short, the "increase in domestic prices due to the gold inflow would discourage exports and encourage imports, thus automatically limiting the amount by which exports would exceed imports".
The economic history of Brazil covers various economic events and traces the changes in the Brazilian economy over the course of the history of Brazil. Portugal, which first colonized the area in the 16th century, enforced a colonial pact with Brazil, an imperial mercantile policy, which drove development for the subsequent three centuries. Independence was achieved in 1822. Slavery was fully abolished in 1888. Important structural transformations began in the 1930s, when important steps were taken to change Brazil into a modern, industrialized economy.
The economy of Montenegro is currently in a process of transition, as it navigates the impacts of the Yugoslav Wars, the decline of industry following the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and economic sanctions imposed by the United Nations.
A tax inversion or corporate tax inversion is a form of tax avoidance where a corporation restructures so that the current parent is replaced by a foreign parent, and the original parent company becomes a subsidiary of the foreign parent, thus moving its tax residence to the foreign country. Executives and operational headquarters can stay in the original country. The US definition requires that the original shareholders remain a majority control of the post-inverted company.
The economic liberalisation in India refers to the economic liberalization of the country's economic policies with the goal of making the economy more market and service-oriented and expanding the role of private and foreign investment. Although unsuccessful attempts at liberalization were made in 1966 and the early 1980s, a more thorough liberalization was initiated in 1991. The reform was prompted by a balance of payments crisis that had led to a severe recession.
A value-added tax (VAT), known in some countries as a goods and services tax (GST), is a type of tax that is assessed incrementally. It is levied on the price of a product or service at each stage of production, distribution, or sale to the end consumer. If the ultimate consumer is a business that collects and pays to the government VAT on its products or services, it can reclaim the tax paid. It is similar to, and is often compared with, a sales tax.
A destination-based cash flow tax (DBCFT) is a form of border adjustment tax (BAT) that was proposed in the United States by the Republican Party in their 2016 policy paper "A Better Way — Our Vision for a Confident America", which promoted a move to the tax. It has been described by some sources as simply a form of import tariff, while others have argued that it has different consequences than those of a simple tariff.