From Maniac Productions to Remote Control

peer reviewe

Effects of local fiscal policy on firm profitability

For decades, scholars and policy-makers have been interested in how fiscal policy influences entrepreneurship. Until now, research has focused on fiscal policy at the federal or regional level and used macro-economic outcome measures. Considerably less attention was given to how municipal governments can influence economic outcomes at the micro level. The present study examines the effect of municipal taxes, spending and tax compliance costs on firm profitability within the Flemish hospitality industry. This is an interesting research setting, since Flemish municipalities have far-ranging fiscal autonomy which has resulted in a proliferation of local taxes, many of which are specific to the hospitality industry. The findings reveal that local taxes have a negative impact on firm profitability, while aggregate public spending has a positive influence. The tax effect is economically relevant and exceeds the public spending impact. Finally, we find no impact of compliance costs from local taxes

A survey of tax compliance costs of Flemish SMEs: magnitude and determinants

This study presents survey evidence on the magnitude and determinants of tax compliance costs in Flemish small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Data were obtained from an Internet questionnaire among members of a professional network of Flemish entrepreneurs, called VOKA. Analyzing a sample of 151 Flemish SMEs, we find that the tax compliance costs exceeding over 7% of gross added value are relatively high. Value-added tax, labor taxes, and corporate taxes are the main components of tax compliance costs. In addition, our evidence confirms the regressivity hypothesis, according to which smaller companies face relatively higher compliance costs. Furthermore, industry, age, and the proportion of blue-collar workers prove to be determining factors of relative compliance costs. Our study concludes by formulating a number of policy recommendations that might contribute to lower compliance costs

What do politicians think of the common consolidated corporate tax base? A Belgian case study

This paper analyzes the views of Belgian politicians on the Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB), an ambitious project to harmonize corporate taxation in the EU. Applying case study methodology, the results show that most politicians were proponents of this new tax system. During the discussions in several political institutions, the politicians referred to the macro-economic impact, the legal certainty and their party’s view to found their opinion. Besides several agreements, certain aspects of CCCTB like the optionality and the applied tax rate involved clear differences in view between left and right-wing politicians, which could hamper a political agreement on CCCTB