Australian Tax Forum
Australian Tax Forum is a prestigious quarterly journal with the objective of providing discussion on issues in tax policy, law and reform amongst tax professionals. It is an essential reference source for understanding and contributing to the development of taxation systems worldwide. Australian Tax Forum is aimed at those who want to influence the future development of tax policy. It is an important journal for tax policy makers, academics and libraries.
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Articles from the current issue:
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The role of the OECD Commentary in tax treaty interpretation.Add to cart
The role of the OECD Commentary in the interpretation of tax treaties is disputed. According to the OECD Committee on Fiscal Affairs, changes to the OECD Commentary are normally applicable to the interpretation of tax treaties concluded before their adoption. This contribution analyzes how the OECD Commentary and related publications of the OECD Committee on Fiscal Affairs fit within the rules on treaty interpretation contained in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. Based on these rules, the relevance of amendments to the OECD Commentary for the interpretation of previously concluded tax treaties is discussed.
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Corporate effective tax rates and tax reform: Evidence spanning Australia's Ralph Review of Business Taxation ReformAdd to cart
Our study analyzes corporate effective tax rates of Australian firms for two periods: the years preceding the Ralph Review of Business Taxation reform (1996-99), and the years following the tax reform (2001-04). We investigate differences in both the level and variation of corporate effective tax rates during these periods, and also identify firm-specific characteristics that explain the changes in corporate effective tax rates over these periods. Evidence is presented which shows that the Ralph Review tax reform caused a significant reduction in both the level and variation of corporate effective tax rates. Moreover, our regression results indicate that corporate effective tax rates are related to some major firm-specific characteristics in Australia before and after the tax reform, including capital intensity, inventory intensity and R&D intensity. Our results suggest that while one of major objectives of the Ralph Review was to promote equity in Australia’s corporate tax system, it still appears inequitable at least regarding several of the firm-specific characteristics considered in this study.
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Losing my Losses: Are the loss restriction rules applying to Australia's tax transparent companies adequate?Add to cart
It has been argued that the Australian government prefers an entity tax approach for business forms providing member(s) with limited liability and separate entity status. This contrasts a number of foreign jurisdictions that have provided tax transparency to such business forms (‘tax transparent companies’), with income and/or losses directly allocated to members for tax purposes. Examples of foreign tax transparent companies include S Corporations and Limited Liability Companies in the United States, Limited Liability Partnerships in the United Kingdom; and Loss Attributing Qualifying Companies and new limited partnerships in New Zealand.
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Finance lease taxation: surviving the TOFA tsunamiAdd to cart
Finance leases are perceived to have anomalous tax benefits, such as fully deductible loan repayments and the ability to transfer tax preferences to the non-economic owner of an asset. This has resulted in several attempts at correction, the most recent being in the context of the TOFA rules. This paper reviews those anomalies in the context of the economic benefit of a finance leases when compared with the way that they are presently taxed and, also, the attempts to redress them. It argues that the taxation of finance leases should not change as some of those perceptions do not stand up under scrutiny. Also, it argues that one other perceived anomalous tax effect puts the debt providers for the acquisition of an asset on the same basis as the equity owners of the asset and, therefore, is unobjectionable. In that regard, the paper extends the understanding of tax and finance leases.
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The impact of Australia’s Fringe Benefits Tax for cars on petrol consumption and greenhouse emissionsAdd to cart
Petrol consumption has become one of the most important sustainability issues for Australia. The central contention in this article is whether Australia’s current Fringe Benefits Tax (FBT) regime is promoting unnecessary mileage (and use of petrol) in salary packaged vehicles to obtain tax concessions under the FBT “statutory formula method” for cars. This article draws together the results of FBT survey data collected via a questionnaire and from respondents’ websites, which has been analysed by the authors. The evidence assembled generally supports the central contention. We have also reviewed and included commentary on similar studies that support our key claim. The findings are important because the questionnaire responses represent a significant sample. The outcomes of our research provide further support for a call to amend the current FBT legislation and therefore foster more environmentally sustainable car salary packaging polices for Australian business.
