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Under the guise of compelling multinational enterprises (MNEs) to pay their fair share of income taxes, the OECD and other multinational agencies have introduced proposals to prevent MNEs from eroding the income tax base of developed economies by continuing to shift income artificially to low or zero tax jurisdictions. Some of the proposals have garnered substantial multinational support, including recent support from the new U.S. presidential administration for a global minimum tax. This Article reviews many of those international proposals. The proposals tend to concentrate the incremental tax revenue from the prevention of base erosion into the treasuries of the developed economies although the minimum tax proposal known as GloBE encourages low tax countries to adopt the minimum rate. The likelihood that zero tax countries will transition successfully to imposing the minimum tax seems uncertain. Developed economies lack a compelling moral claim to incremental revenue so this Article argues that collecting a fair tax from MNEs and other taxpayers should be a goal that is independent of claims on that revenue. This Article maintains that to prevent tax base erosion, the income tax base and administration must be uniform across national borders and the Article recommends applying uniform rules administered by an international taxing agency. The Article explores the convergence of tax rules under such an international taxing agency. Distribution of tax revenue by the international agency should follow contextualized need. In addressing the conundrum of absolute poverty in the undeveloped and developing world vis á vis relative poverty in the developed world, the Article proposes that the taxing agency should distribute all incremental revenue from the uniform tax where the need is greatest to ameliorate absolute poverty and improve living standards without regard to income source. The location of income production, destination of the produced goods and services generating the income, and residence of the income producers should not determine the tax revenue distribution. Rather, the use of contextualized need for distribution determination will enable developed economies to receive sufficient revenue to maintain their existing infrastructures and governmental services. Developed economies should forego new revenue, for which they have not budgeted, in favor of improving worldwide living conditions for all. The proposals for uniform, worldwide taxation and revenue sharing based on contextualized need are admittedly aspirational and utopian but designed to encourage debate on sharing of resources in our increasingly globalized world.

Sustainable taxation requires stability and predictability. Sustainable taxation is a tax or taxes that collect sufficient revenue to support the governmental goods and services the society needs and wants. The taxes must provide for 1) even-handedness -- something akin to horizontal equity, 2) distributional fairness -- a concept emerging from notions of vertical equity, 3) transparency in application so that the populace understands and accepts the tax and the need for it and 4) collection mechanisms that do not favor some societal groups, especially those with resources to secure creative tax advisors, over others who lack the resources. Narrow base taxes – fuel, alcohol, tobacco -- cannot meet these criteria and the broad base taxes currently applicable – value added, payroll and income – also fail to meet one or more of the criteria. While specialized taxes like environmental taxes and sin taxes (alcohol, tobacco) serve useful regulatory functions and may achieve their behavioral objectives in part, they do so primarily by increasing the cost of engaging in the undesirable behavior and pricing some actors out of the activity. Using a pricing rather than a direct regulatory mechanism, the specialized taxes change the conversation from social rejection of the behavior to acceptance as long as the actor is willing and able to pay the high price. Is it all right to pollute if one pays to do so? Direct regulation might prove less regressive and less likely to be viewed as simply a matter of price and more as a matter of societal mainstream and commitment to addressing a problem. To secure sustainable taxation this article recommends a non-preferential income tax on a comprehensive income tax base. While by no means a new idea, the growing resource disparity between affluent individuals and individuals with limited resources renders the idea of a non-preferential income tax on all income including realized and unrealized gains all the more compelling. The paper outlines a method for transition to the recommended tax base from the current realization-based tax base and suggests that in limited cases a taxpayer might defer payment of tax on some items of income but not defer inclusion of the items in the tax base. As it describes its tax plan, the paper reflects on the objectives and shortcomings of the targeted taxes and purposive tax base modifications that have proliferated during the 20th century. The paper concludes that a non-comprehensive tax base may accomplish narrow objectives successfully but is unlikely to become functionally sustainable to support essential governmental goods and services. Neither are targeted taxes and purposive tax base modifications fully justifiable. They are likely to distribute tax burdens unevenly among taxpayers without any compelling reason for preferring some taxpayers to others. The narrowness of the base of such taxes frequently leads to regressive tax incidence.

This article reviews some federal and state constitutional law challenges to tax legislation in the US and considers how taxing and other revenue raising legislation tends to withstand constitutional challenge.Part I of this article examines instances in which the Supreme Court reviewed state taxing laws for conflict with the Constitution and overruled its earlier decisions in similar cases. One case involving a poll or capitation tax worked its way through the courts as the Constitution was being amended to prevent the states from using a poll tax in the future. Another case from 2018 resolves a longstanding tax collection and avoidance problem with state sales taxes. Part II focuses on a single longstanding Supreme Court precedent limiting federal tax law under the Constitution which Congress increasingly has not followed. The decision and recent congressional action is contextual in the current discussions of other taxing proposals. Part III considers some areas in which constitutional limitations exist but legislatures and courts seem to have no interest in addressing the limitations. Part IV concludes

Henry Ordower discusses the effect that legislating economic incentives through the tax system has on taxpayer behaviour and explores the resulting difficulty in drawing the line between legitimate and objectionable tax avoidance. He argues that while the attempts to separate the two types of tax avoidance – attempts such as enacting general anti-avoidance rules (GAARs) and following general principles of economic substance – may be partially successful, subsidies delivered through the tax system will inherently limit their effect. The lack of clear delineation between legitimate tax planning and objectionable tax avoidance enables an even firmer embedding of "the culture of tax avoidance" into the society. Perspectives on the tax avoidance culture: legislative, administrative, and judicial ambiguity in Yulia Epifantseva (Boston, USA) and Nigar Hashimzade (Durham, UK) editors, The Routledge Companion To Tax Avoidance Research 26 (2017) (copy of book in fac. pubs case in library in case you get back there.