This article appeared in the Wall Street Journal on March 18, 2010
In the wake of his party’s crushing defeat in regional elections, it’s time to take stock of Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidency, three years on. As in the USSR between 1985 and 1991, France has of late experienced a period of perestroika: The government recognizes the need to reform the system, but is simultaneously trying to save it. The hitch is that the system itself is unreformable. It must be replaced.
Despite all the troubles he has to face, President Obama keeps renewing his commitment to move forward with his plan to reform healthcare. His intention is to partly finance the reform with tax increases (there will also be cost savings in healthcare programs) and, not surprisingly, to shift the general burden a bit more to the wealthiest. Looking more closely at the proposal, however, it appears that it will increase one of the most economically harmful taxes: the tax on savings.
The French minister of finance Eric Woerth is ready to consider the possibility for France to write down in the Constitution a rule for the equilibrium of public finances. He…
The Washington state Senate approved a tax package that would raise $890 million over the next sixteen months. The tax package includes a temporary three-tenths-of-a-cent sales tax increase plus increased…
The Institute of Economic Affairs is publishing a study on the burden of tax compliance and administration in the UK.
This monograph shows the severely regressive nature of the costs of complying with the UK tax system – small firms suffer far more than large firms from the imposition of government bureaucracy related to tax collection.
The European Commission is working on a study of the impacts that a tax on carbon emissions would have in the European Union. The Commission is about to come up in the coming months with a proposal for a “green” tax.
Before the appointment of the new commissioners last year, the Commission was considering a proposal for minimum tax on energy products based on their carbon dioxide emissions as part of a broader plan to reform energy taxation in the Union.
The annual report of the World Bank is announcing a record level of the number of business regulation reforms in the world. Between June 2008 and May 2009, 287 reforms were recorded in 131 economies, 20% more than the year before.The good news are that “reformers focused on making it easier to start and operate a business, strengthening property rights and improving the efficiency of commercial dispute resolution and bankruptcy procedures”, as one can read in the report. Eastern Europe was one of the more active regions. Here is the ranking of the 27 European countries:
This article appeared in The Wall Street Journal on February 24, 2010
In the 20th century, we often heard the maxim, “the war is the health of the state.” In the 21st, fear has become the health of the state. We are encouraged to fear all manner of things—for our finances, for our health, for the planet. But the solution—more power to the state—is always the same.
This article appeared in the Wall Street Journal on February 24, 2010
Several European countries have used complex fiscal instruments and aggressive bookkeeping in order to meet the euro zone fiscal ceilings, according to an article published in the Wall Street Journal. Indeed, the caps of a debt level below 60% of the GDP and of a budget deficit below 3% is apparently source of trouble even for countries with a reputation of rigorous public finances.
