Taxation, Redistribution and Progressivity: An Introduction.

The ability of any government to raise revenue by taxation is a fundamental part of its constitution, and many historical constitutional changes have been driven by taxation issues. Taxation is not only a major source of revenue for governments of industrialised countries. It is also used, in combination with transfer payments, to influence the inequality of incomes. Tax systems may also have unintended consequences for inequality. It is therefore not surprising that taxation is continually subject to heated debate. The recent debate regarding tax reform in Australia is just one example that serves to illustrate how complicated the issues are and how strongly people sometimes disagree about the appropriate policy.