Part of the "Economics Today" series, which surveys contemporary topics in applied economics, this book looks at taxation.

Table of Contents

Part 1 What are taxes for?: what is a tax?; why not print money?; markets fail; incomes and jobs; a large roll. Part 2 Judging taxes: equity; efficiency; other principles; conflicts. Part 3 Supply-side economics or demand management: the budget; the supply-side; demand management; supply incentives or demand manipulation? Part 4 Is Britain over-taxed? UK taxes; revenue growth; Britain and other countries; are we over-taxed? Part 5 Who pays?: impact, shifting, incidence; the rich and the poor; families' taxes; fair shares. Part 6 Income tax - incentives and other problems: income tax and capital gains tax; tax and incentives - income tax and labour supply; the tax unit - sex and status; tax breaks - tax expenditures; reforming income tax. Part 7 Taxing spending: taxes on goods and services; value added tax; specific duties; indirect taxes and Europe; equity, efficiency and revenue. Part 8 Making corporations pay: business taxes; corporation tax principles; UK corporation tax; more problems; conclusion - did the 1984 reforms go too far? Part 9 Paying for social security: social security; national insurance; how taxes and benefits interact; reform. Part 10 What about the wealthy?: wealth and property and how to tax them; property taxes in practice; property taxes in OECD countries; taxing wealth in Britain; what should we do? Part 11 Local taxes: central and local government; finance for local government; local government finance in Britain - the rates; the community charge and the uniform business rate; the future. Part 12 Tax reform; tax reform in practice; tax reform in theory - the direct tax base.