Academics from Oxford University’s Centre for Business Taxation (CBT) have shown little support for the European Commission’s plans for a European financial transactions tax (FTT).
The Task Force on Financial Integrity & Economic Development’s annual conference in Paris last week showed how taxpayers could benefit from a more transparent reporting standard, but activists admitted they must do more to engage companies in the debate.
Manfred Bergmann, director for Indirect Taxation and Tax Administration at the DG Taxation and Customs Union at the European Commission, has told International Tax Review why the Commission changed course and came out with a proposal for a financial transactions tax (FTT).
Environmental taxation has been a divisive issue in recent years. But if there was one strong conclusion at Green Budget Europe's annual conference hosted by the European Environment Agency in Copenhagen last month, it was that the EU's Energy Tax Directive (ETD) was not working effectively and that the Commission's proposed revisions were a welcome improvement.
The financial transactions tax (FTT), also known as the Tobin tax and the Robin Hood Tax, has been the stuff of legend for decades, discussed eagerly by academics and socialist economists, without ever gaining much traction in the mainstream. The financial maelstrom changed all that and, as José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, comes forward with a proposal for an EU-wide FTT, everyone will be talking about it.
