Public finance and taxation Books

Book SynopsisTaxes connect us to one another, to the common good, and to the future. This is a book about taxes: who pays what and who gets what. More than that, it's about the role of government, about citizenship and our collective well-being, about the Canada we want. The contributors, leading Canadian practitioners and scholars, explore how taxes have become a political ""no-go zone"" and how changes in taxation are changing Canada. They challenge the view that any tax is a bad tax and provide broad directions for fairer and smarter approaches. This is a book that will be of interest to anyone concerned with public policy and public affairs, economics, and political science and to anyone interested in challenging the conventional wisdom that lower taxes and smaller government are the cures to what ails us.Trade Review"How much are we willing to pay to live in a good and prosperous country? Do we have a tax system that is fair and efficient? What public goods and services do we want our governments to provide? If democracies exist only by the virtue of the engagement of citizens, then we need to have the courage to have a new conversation about taxation. Read this book. Get informed by experts on the politics, economics, and social dimensions of taxation. Tell your friends to read it. Then have a conversation with your member of parliament. The future of Canada will be better for it." -- Kevin Page, Canada's first parliamentary budget officer; Jean-Luc Pepin Research Chair, University of Ottawa"What happened to the Canada that could solve national problems, support people in hard times, and improve life for each successive generation? This book provides the answer: twenty years of cumulative tax cuts have undermined the can-do Canada our parents and grandparents built. Better still it points the way out of this cul-de-sac, beginning with an honest conversation about how we pay for the nation we want to be. It can't start soon enough." -- Carol Goar, 'The Toronto Star'Table of Contents Tax Is Not a Four-Letter Word: A Different Take on Taxes in Canada, edited by Alex Himelfarb and and Jordan Himelfarb Preface Introduction: Tax Is Not a Four-Letter Word Alex Himelfarb and Jordan Himelfarb Part 1: The Conversation Today Chapter 1: The Economic Consequences of Taxing (and Spending) Jim Stanford Chapter 2: Taxes and Transfers in Canada: The Federal Dimension Robin Boadway Chapter 3: Taxes and Public Services Hugh Mackenzie Chapter 4: Benefits from Public Services Hugh Mackenzie Chapter 5: Canadian Public Opinion on Taxes Frank Graves Part 2: How We Got Here Chapter 6: Taxation and the Neo-liberal Counter-Revolution: The Canadian Case Matt Fodor Chapter 7: A Brief Potted History of Ottawa's Tax Cut Mania Eugene Lang and Philip DeMont Chapter 8: Tax Cuts and Other Cheap Parlour Tricks Trish Hennessey Part 3: A Different Take on Taxes Chapter 9: Towards A Fair Canadian Tax System Marc Lee and Iglika Ivanova Chapter 10: Carbon Taxes: Can a Good Policy Become Good Politics? Stéphane Dion Chapter 11: How Small Changes Can Make a Big Difference: The Case of Financial Transaction Taxes Toby Sanger Chapter 12: We Need to Simplify and Re-focus the Tax System C. Scott Clark Part 4: How to Get There Chapter 13: Canada's Conservative Ideological Infrastructure: Brewing a Cup of Cappuccino Conservatism Paul Saurette and Shane Gunster Conclusion Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisMultinational corporations face different tax systems in different countries that require careful tax planning. A systematic approach is needed to minimize and avoid unnecessary business taxes. Some core issues of international taxation are part of a successful corporate tax plan in an international context. The first issue is a good understanding and appreciation of the principles of international taxation that include the different philosophies of taxation, the different kinds of taxes, the different tax systems, the different tax treaties and potential tax havens. The second issue is a thorough understanding of U.S. taxation of foreign income to avoid double taxation and the computation of foreign tax credits. The third issue is the choice of a transfer pricing method and the compliance with tax regulations on both the transfer of tangible and intangible assets. The fourth issue is the intelligent use of tax vehicles for exporting which can generate substantial savings and reduce the effective tax rate and involve the choice between the interest-charge domestic international sales corporation and the foreign sales corporation. A final issue is the efficient use of value-added taxation for activities taking place outside the U.S., and a new appreciation of the potential of this form of taxation for the United States. Practicing accountants, academics, business executives, students, legislators, and others who want a better understanding of the complex issues of international taxation will be interested in this book.Table of ContentsPreface Principles of International Taxation U.S. Taxation of Foreign Income Transfer Pricing Tax Incentives for Exporting Value-Added Taxation Selected Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisEven before the advent of COVID19, India's economy was in a depression. The condition of vast masses of people, particularly those in the informal sector, was grave. Then the Indian government, responding to the COVID pandemic, imposed the most stringent lockdown measures in the world. The lockdown had a particularly severe impact on the majority of India's people, who number well over one billion. At the same time, the Indian government, compared to other world governments, has provided virtually no financial aid to cushion economic blows to its population. Crisis and Predation explains that this shocking tightfistedness stems from the fact that global financial interests, as well as India’s ruling neofascist government, explicitly oppose any sizable expansion of government spending by India. Crisis and Predation, a project of the Mumbai based Research Unit for Political Economy, lays out in meticulous and harrowing detail the economic – and human – crisis currently unfolding in India. As the COVID situation unfolds and pandemic deaths skyrocket, prevailing emergency conditions encourage reliance on security forces, state surveillance, detention of political activists, and censorship of independent media. And yet, this book contends, India could defy the pressures of global finance in order to address the basic needs of its people, an objective within the reach of India's present material capacity. But this would require imposing controls on destabilizing flows of foreign capital and being prepared to forgo foreign capital flows in the future, in other words, a course of democratic national development. For that, Indian rulers would need just what they currently lack: a positive vision of democracy and class alliance to bring it about. This hard hitting and carefully researched book, offering devastating financial analysis, also offers hope for change.

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Book SynopsisWhen President James Monroe announced in 1824 that the large public debt inherited from the War for Independence, the Louisiana Purchase, and the War of 1812 would be extinguished on January 1, 1835, Congress responded by crafting legislation to transform that prediction into reality. Yet John Quincy Adams, Monroe's successor, seemed not to share the commitment to debt freedom, resulting in the rise of opposition to his administration and his defeat for reelection in the bitter presidential campaign of 1828\. The new president, Andrew Jackson, was thoroughly committed to debt freedom, and when it was achieved, it became the only time in American history when the country carried no national debt. In A Nation Wholly Free: The Elimination of the National Debt in the Age of Jackson, award-winning economic historian Carl Lane shows that the great and disparate issues that confronted Jackson, such as internal improvements, the “war” against the Second Bank of the United States, and the crisis surrounding South Carolina's refusal to pay federal tariffs, become unified when debt freedom is understood as a core element of Jacksonian Democracy. The era of debt freedom lasted only two years and ten months. As the government accumulated a surplus, a fully developed opposition party emerged—the beginning of our familiar two-party system—over rancor about how to allocate the newfound money. Not only did government move into an oppositional party system, the debate about the size and role of government distinguished the parties in a pattern that has become familiar. The partisan debate over national debt and expenditures led to poorly thought out legislation, forcing the government to resume borrowing. As a result, after Jackson left office in 1837, the country fell into a major depression. We have been borrowing ever since on an enormous scale. A thoughtful, engaging account with strong relevance to today, A Nation Wholly Free is the fascinating story of an achievement that now seems fanciful.

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Book Synopsis​Our money system is a toxic left-over from a time when theft on a grand scale – war and empire-building – was glorified. Today, we need to move on from a system that allows and encourages the worst in us (and the worst among us) to prosper. We take the money system for granted. » We accept that banks have the right to create, rent out and then destroy money. » We accept that banks have a right to charge us (and our government) interest on this money. » We accept that the system enhances inequality, drives climate change, degrades our planet, promotes war and conflict, and has always led to eventual disaster. But why do we accept this manifestly undemocratic money system, which serves only to concentrate power and wealth in the hands of organisations and individuals that have profit – not our collective interests – at heart? Curious to find the answer, researcher and writer Ivo Mosley set out to uncover – and tell – the story of how money-creation works and how it came to be this way. Many years in the writing, this book is not an attack on individuals or a rant against bankers. Rather it’s a remarkably clear and comprehensive examination of a system that supports unaccountable and destructive power. It also points the way to the simple reforms that are necessary if we wish to create a more just and equitable world. Easily accessible to readers with no previous knowledge of economics and finance, this is a book for anyone interested in creating a fairer and more sustainable society in the face of economic, financial and environmental crisis.Table of ContentsIntroduction CHAPTER ONE: The Money Supply CHAPTER TWO: Laws That Make Robbery Legal CHAPTER THREE: How Money Works Today: A Quick Summary CHAPTER FOUR: Early Days CHAPTER FIVE: Bubbles and Adam Smith CHAPTER SIX: America, Won and Lost CHAPTER SEVEN: Secrets, Ignorance and Lies CHAPTER EIGHT: Negotiable Debt: A Bit of History CHAPTER NINE: Reform Bibliography Appendix 1: Sir John Holt’s remarks on promissory notes Appendix 2: Extract from The Promissory Notes Act, 1704 Glossary Index

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