The paper questions the view that international tax relations had a decisive impact on the dismissal of expenditure tax scenarios as guidelines for recent national tax reforms in industrialized countries. It is argued that the introduction of consumption-type value-added tax systems must be regarded a step towards expenditure taxation favoured by international agreements and that double taxation treaties should not be regarded as a specific obstacle against a reform of national enterprise taxation with respect to cash flow concepts. Nevertheless a political economy view may explain that international tax avoidance and rent seeking made multinational enterprises reluctant to support an expenditure tax regime.
展开▼
