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Copyright of FinanzRundschau is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of International Business Studies is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article discusses proposed reforms to the retention benefit according to § 34a EStG and adjustments to the option model in Germany, highlighted in a draft law on growth opportunities presented by the Ministry of Finance on July 14, 2023. It states that the reform aims to align the tax burden on retained profits for individuals and partnerships with that of corporations. It emphasizes the positive impact on family-owned businesses and the need for further clarification.

The article focuses on laws governing tax defense rights in Germany. It mentions that the effectiveness of anti-abuse decisions also arise because non-abusive behavior can affect the equal tax burden and tax revenue just as much as abusive actions. It also mentions cross-border transactions involving states whose regulations the German tax legislature, with reference to international resolutions.

The article discusses the Germany Bundesverfassungsgericht court case dealing with tariff limitation on commercial income. The court held that non-fiscal promotion and control goals pursued with the help of tax law are only suitable to provide justifying reasons for tax burdens or relief if either the goal and limit of the control are factually defined or the desired promotion or control goal is at least supported by a recognizable legislative decision becomes.

Copyright of Die Unternehmensbesteuerung (Ubg) is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In most developed countries there exist ample possibilities for individuals to minimize their personal income tax burden by means of tax deductions. The associated revenue losses for the government have been estimated for a variety of tax deductions. However, relatively little is known about the share of eligible taxpayers who actually use these deductions, and, more specifically, about what determines utilization. The present paper tries to shed some light on this question in the context of the tax deductibility of expenses for child care in Germany. Using survey data on actual child care expenses and official tax-return data on deductions for child-care expenses, we derive utilization rates. We also analyze the determinants of utilization among those who filed a tax-return, using a subsample of the tax-return data. Our estimation results show that (potential) tax breaks from utilization are significantly positively correlated with the probability of utilization. Other kinds of deductions are also highly significant, suggesting that knowledge of tax statutes as well as opportunity costs matter. Moreover, we simulate the effects of a policy reform that enhances the generosity of deductions on the utilization rate. Such a reform would substantially increase utilization. Our results indicate that responses in utilization are more important than potential responses in labor supply. (JEL codes: D14, H24, H43). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inheritance tax is often seen as an effective tool to reduce wealth inequality, to raise public revenues if needed, and to increase incentives to work by lowering the tax burden on labour, which is especially high in Germany, according to the OECD. The purpose of this paper is therefore to shed light on the question of whether an inheritance tax is a promising tool for fighting wealth inequality without having distorting effects on the economy. For this purpose, firstly, the distributional effects of inheritances on wealth distribution are evaluated for Germany and are then compared with those in Austria and France, using data from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS). A change in the German inheritance tax law in 2009 is further used in a difference-in-difference analysis to identify the behavioural effects of the change in the inheritance tax on the volume of bequests, which are large and robust for different specifications. Secondly, the insight from part one is applied to the design of an inheritance tax reform for Germany. The potential tax revenue of the reform can be estimated by using the data from the inheritance and gift tax statistics. A revenue shift from income to inheritance tax could be used to increase work incentives by cutting the marginal tax rates for the working population. However, it turns out that taxing inheritances will be accompanied by significant behavioural responses of donors via tax planning. Furthermore, the introduction of a flat tax model with a broad tax base would not generate enough additional revenue to foster relevant employment effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Germany reintroduced parity funding of the statutory health insurance scheme in January 2019 by lowering the contribution rates for employees and raising those for employers, leaving the total rate constant. This reduces the tax wedge between total labour costs and net wages. After a small demand impulse on impact, followed by a small downturn in the first two years after implementation, an estimated New Keynesian DSGE model indicates small positive long-run output and employment effects. However, the reduced tax wedge leads to lower public revenues. Aggregate macroeconomic and welfare effects will depend on how the government compensates for these revenue losses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses tax obligations and legal consequences of cross-border home office agreements or double taxation agreements between Austria and Germany on home office activities of cross-border employees due to the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. Topics include impact of the treaty law on tax collection and the wage tax deduction procedure; assessment of tax burden on Austrian and German employees working cross-border; and tax treatment of domestic income from non-self-employed.

This paper provides empirical evidence on how intergovernmental revenue relations would affect governments' incentives on tax enforcement in a developing country. By taking advantage of the exogenous shock induced by China's corporate tax income revenue sharing reform in 2002, I find that the local governments would increase tax enforcement on local business tax and surcharges (BTS) to offset the adverse fiscal shock. In addition, such tougher tax enforcement was heterogeneous across firms. The increased effective BTS was mostly driven by non-state-owned enterprises and domestic firms. This paper further shows that the incidence of corporate tax could be passed onto workers through lower wages and benefits. On average, the share of corporate tax burden borne by workers in China is approximately 62%, which is higher than the estimate in Germany (Fuest et al. in Am Econ Rev 108(2):393–418, 2018). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the direct incidence of the corporate income tax (CIT) through wage bargaining, using an industry‐region level panel dataset on all corporations in Germany over the period 1998–2006. For the first time we account for employment effects which result from tax‐induced wage changes. Workers share in reductions of the CIT burden; yet, the net effect of wage bargaining on the corporate wage bill, after an exogenous €1 decrease in the CIT burden, is as little as 19–28 cents. This is about half of the effect obtained in prior literature focussing on wages alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes to the literature on fiscal equalization and corporate tax competition. The innovation is that we explicitly model multinational enterprises and a corporate tax system that is designed according to formula apportionment. Two main results are obtained. First, in contrast to previous studies we identify cases where tax revenue equalization is better in mitigating detrimental tax competition than tax base equalization. Second, tax base equalization nevertheless has the advantage that it may render tax rates efficient, depending on the shape of the apportionment formula. A pure payroll formula does not ensure efficiency, but a back‐of‐the‐envelope calibration of our model to Canadian provinces suggests that a pure sales formula may be optimal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the incidence of corporate taxes on wages using a 20-year panel of German municipalities exploiting 6,800 tax changes for identification. Using event study designs and difference-in-differences models, we find that workers bear about one-half of the total tax burden. Administrative linked employer-employee data allow us to estimate heterogeneous firm and worker effects. Our findings highlight the importance of labor market institutions and profit-shifting opportunities for the incidence of corporate taxes on wages. Moreover, we show that low-skilled, young, and female employees bear a larger share of the tax burden. This has important distributive implications. (JEL H25, H31, H71, J16, J24, J31) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides evidence on the question of who bears the burden of social security contributions (SSC) in Germany over a long-term horizon. Following Alvaredo et al. (De Econ, 2017) we exploit kinks in the budget set generated by a drop in the marginal SSC rate at earnings caps for health and long-term care insurance. These concave kinks lead to discontinuities in the distributions of gross earnings, net earnings, or labor costs which-in the absence of labor supply responses-are informative about economic incidence. Administrative data for West Germany from 1975 to 2010 facilitate a comprehensive incidence analysis. Finding no evidence for labor supply responses and no significant discontinuities in gross earnings distributions, we conclude that neither employers nor employees shift a substantial part of their SSC burden. These results are consistent over the whole time period and hold for several robustness checks corroborating previous findings for Germany. A small trend towards a slight increase in the SSC burden for employees is not statistically significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Die Unternehmensbesteuerung (Ubg) is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study primarily aims to contribute to the ongoing debates on bracket creep and examine whether Germany needs to integrate inflation indexation into its personal income tax system in order to reduce distortions of tax liabilities and additional tax burdens. Germany has continuously flattened the personal income tax rates in the context of a series of tax reforms and modified its tax system. Under the consideration of the major goals of these reforms, this study compares the extent to which previous reform efforts, made in this country since 1958, led to changes in the real, inflation-adjusted average personal income tax burden of single earners in 2014. Furthermore this study examines the changes in progressivity of tax rates over the same period of time, which is measured by the coefficient of residual income progression (CRIP). According to the longterm real view adopted in this study, the evolution of the German personal income tax system made middle-income single earners worse off, while both the lower and higher income groups are significantly better off. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tax research mostly uses actual tax rates ('objective tax rates') to analyze and explain tax effects on taxpayers' decisions and tax distribution. In this study, we asked subjects to estimate how high their tax burden is, and to give their opinion if, or to what extent, they would consider this perceived tax rate as fair. We provide evidence that the perceived income tax rates significantly deviate from the objective tax rates for the majority of taxpayers. The degree of misperception can be partly explained by the individual's level of education, income, and whether the individual included social security contribution in their income tax rate estimation. Comparing the perceived tax rate with the tax rate that is regarded as fair, we find that the individual's level of education and age influence their estimate. Taking the results of Schmoelders (Das Irrationale in der öffentlichen Finanzwirtschaft. Rowohlt, Hamburg, ) into account, we show that the income tax misperception as well as the relation between perceived and fair income tax rates is surprisingly stable over time. The main distinction is that there is no more difference in tax perception between self-employed and employed people nowadays. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article assesses the redistributive effects of a key element of German climate policy, the promotion of renewables in the electricity generation mix through the provision of a feed-in tariff. The tariff shapes the distribution of households' disposable incomes by charging a levy that is proportional to household electricity consumption and by transferring financial resources to households who are feeding green electricity into the public grid. Our study builds on representative household survey data, providing information on various socio-demographics, household electricity consumption, and ownership of photovoltaic facilities. The redistributive effects of the feed-in tariff are evaluated by means of inequality indices. All the indices indicate that Germany's feed-in tariff is regressive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We estimate an AIDS for fresh meat in Germany. • We derive price and expenditure elasticities for households overall and by age and. income. • We assess ad valorem and excise tax scenarios to curb climate gas emissions. • Older households are more effected by meat taxes than young households. • Excise taxes are more efficient to reach carbon emission reductions This paper assesses the effect of different meat tax designs in Germany including increasing the value-added tax as well as two climate-gas-emission-sensitive excise tax scenarios. For the simulation study, we first estimate price and expenditure elasticities for fresh meat for different household types using data from the GfK ConsumerScan FreshFood panel over the period 2012–14. The estimated elasticities are used to derive budget and welfare effects for the tax scenarios. A general rise in the value-added tax from 7% to 19% leads to a welfare loss of 0.83 euros per household per month. Disentangling the effect by household group according to income and age shows that low-income and older households experience a higher welfare loss and bear a larger tax burden relative to their income compared to low-income and younger households, respectively. Comparing the different taxation scenarios highlights the comparative efficiency of excise taxes and the importance to consider effects on older households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The perception that the government bond buying program (OMT) announced by the ECB may lead to future tax burdens on countries, in particular on Germany, is based on an erroneous application of solvency principles that apply to private agents, but not to central banks. We argue that the creditor nations' taxpayers, in particular the German taxpayers, will receive tax revenue from the implementation of the OMT. We also measure the size of the bond-buying program that is compatible with price stability. It turns out that this estimate critically depends on whether the Eurozone stays in a liquidity trap situation or not. Today, as the Eurozone is still in a liquidity trap there is no limit to the amount of government bonds the ECB can buy without triggering inflation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reintroduction of a wealth tax in Germany would not contribute to more fairness in terms of the ability to pay principle. On the contrary: Since wealth in form of human capital is not taxed, a wealth tax would lead to a massive unequal treatment of people with the same ability to pay. The expected shift of the tax burden would hit low-income households in particular. Economic performance would decrease and the labour market would be negatively affected. Overall, the wealth tax cannot deliver what its promoters in the political arena promise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If the revenue from corporate taxation in Germany is divided by the corporate income figures from national accounts, companies' average tax burden for the period 2001 to 2008 is 21 percent. This rate is considerably lower than the statutory tax rates for this period. The reason for this is that tax-reported corporate income was well below macroeconomic corporate income. This taxation gap was something in the order of at least 120 billion euros in 2007, or almost five percent of gross domestic product (GDP). Moreover, the high level of tax losses and tax losses carried forward is significant. The losses carried forward for corporate income tax rose to 568 billion euros by the end of 2007. This was equivalent to 23.5 percent of GDP and 3.5 times the corporate income tax base for that year. As a result of broadening the tax base as part of the corporate tax reform of 2008, the taxation gap has diminished significantly, but it was still at about 90 billion euros, or 3.7 percent of GDP. Due to a lack of detailed statistics, it is currently not possible to accurately identify the reasons for the difference between macroeconomic profit figures and the corporate tax base. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of fiscal convergence in the EU is a relevant issue in the context of economic integration and fiscal harmonization and we report new empirical evidence on this topic using a time series approach. We apply unit root and stationarity tests with an endogenous break for the study of long run, deterministic and stochastic convergence of the national tax burden taking Germany, the United Kingdom and the European average as benchmarks. Only the United Kingdom and Germany show long run convergence and few countries converge despite harmonization efforts and fiscal competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Schmollers Jahrbuch is the property of Duncker & Humblot GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The latest German tax reform addresses the reduction of the corporate tax burden as well as the issue of tax shifting activities by multinationals. With the aid of ifoMOD, a dynamic computable general equilibrium model, we quantify the outcome of this reform. Our results show that the reform induces a significant decline in corporate sector investments since those firms suffer a cumulative double taxation. As a consequence, GDP decreases by 0.6% in the long-run and overall welfare declines by 0.7% in terms of GDP. The economic activity could, however, be enhanced, if one would abstract from taxing capital gains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In particular in Germany and Austria, but also in other countries, extensive theoretical and analytical research has been published on the potential tax effects should International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) be used as the basis for corporate taxation. Very few quantitative papers exist. This motivated us to conduct a study that quantifies the actual effects of a potential decisiveness of IFRS for the national tax base - without further questioning the usefulness of an IFRS relevance. Our paper extends existing research substantially. The research question of our paper deals with the measurement through simulation of differences in the discounted tax burden in various scenarios. Our sample comprises original data from 61 Austrian companies. The median of the difference between book values of IFRS single accounts and tax accounts for specific balance sheet items is determined. We then apply the result to the items of a typical corporate account derived from an Austrian database. As a result, depending on the term of items, we can calculate the discounted tax effects for different scenarios. It must be underlined that such highly confidential and detailed tax data is usually not available to researchers. The main preliminary finding of our empirical survey is that only in a few cases we find essential differences between IFRS and tax accounts. Our evidence suggests that no dramatic change in the tax base is to be expected. Our study provides not only new empirical evidence but also a basis for further research on a possible common consolidated corporate tax base from an academic perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on how peoples beliefs about whether taxation is just or unjust impact on how they behave in relation to things like tax evasion or avoidance. It presents result of a survey carried out in Berlin, Germany in autumn 2004 on of the perceived fairness of taxation, based on a random sample of 3,000 addresses taken from the Berlin register of residents, stratified on the basis of age and gender. A total of 586 completed questionnaires were returned, giving a net response rate of approximately twenty per cent. Those surveyed were asked to state the actual amount of tax they had paid in 2003. Following this, they were asked to use an 11-point scale to rate whether they believed this tax burden to be unjustly low, just, or unjustly high

This paper analyzes how inflation-induced erosions of nominally defined amounts built into relevant tax rules (“bracket creep”) alter distributional and revenue-generating properties of income taxes and social insurance contributions. Using a multi-country tax-benefit model, it provides quantitative estimates for Germany, the Netherlands and the U.K. In the absence of automatic inflation adjustment mechanisms, effects on individual tax burdens can be substantial, even with low inflation. Bracket creep is found to reduce tax progressivity. At the same time, overall tax revenues increase. In terms of tax systems’ equalizing capacities, which depend on both these factors, the second effect dominates: if tax systems were left unadjusted then inflation would lead to lower and slightly more equally distributed household incomes. However, existing inflation adjustment regimes in the Netherlands and the U.K. successfully prevent large tax burdens changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A recent article presents effective corporate tax burdens for a number of countries. Its authors conclude that Germany can be considered to be a low tax country by international comparison, and that a tax reform which aims at reducing the effective tax burden on German corporations is not necessary. In our paper, we critically review the method used for that study. In a second step, we present approaches which we assume to be better suited for such an analysis, and results generated by these approaches. We conclude that Germany cannot be considered to be a low tax country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on political issues and developments in Germany as of the year 1997. It states that the most controversial issue that took place in Germany during the year concerns economic policies. The governing Christian-Liberal coalition proposed a far-reaching tax reform aimed at reducing the overall tax burden in January 1997. Opposition parties disapproved the proposal for its alleged bias in favor of the rich. Negotiations between the government and the Social Democrats over the tax reform did not materialize since the party favored a reform that would have reduced tax loads for lower income groups.

Until 1924 Germany was on a paper standard. Reparation payments under London settlement did indeed cause the mark to depredate, to a value finally of one billionth of a dollar, but exports did not exceed imports. In 1924 came the Dawes Plan. It adopted for the first time as a rule of procedure the principle of capacity to pay. It passed no judgment on capacity, and was less concerned with immediate than with ultimate capacity. It sought chiefly to establish the conditions which would develop and test capacity. This was indeed a great advance, it put the problem in a new and hopeful setting. The Dawes Plan set up the necessary condition to test capacity to pay. The gold standard was restored, and protected by transfer clauses conditioning reparation payments upon its maintenance. The budget was to be balanced, and for the first time reparation payments were budgeted. The plan sought to adjust the tax burden by gradual stages to German capacity, and it relied on a preliminary foreign loan to ease the transfer process.

The article discusses tax policy and tax equity for families in Germany. A June 1954 law is discussed which gives tax free subsidies for each child in a family. Payment of such subsidies through the employer is said to be deemed absurd insofar as the firm has no interest in family size, whereas the society as a whole does.

The article discusses legislative recommendations from the German Bundesministerium für Familie und Jugend for revised tax burden equalization adjustments that would more greatly benefit less affluent families with several children. Additionally, benefits are included to encourage the education of children beyond age 18. A bonus is provided for the first year of a child's life as well as for the first born child.

The article lists four questions about German equalization of burden sharing with families and follows with four answers. The income tax abatement and children's assistance are described as inadequate. Support for exemptions for families are recommended to be increased to 1680 DM and child subsidies to take effect with the second rather than third child.