China S Tax Reform Options

Selected papers presented at the International Symposium on Reform of the Chinese Tax System, held at the University of Western Ontario, in London, Canada, in Aug. 1996.

The authors of this work argue strongly that the decentralization that has taken place in China over the past two decades threatens to undermine the future of reform and perhaps even the state itself. They contend that reform has undermined state capacity in China, and that the state's fiscal revenues, as a percentage of GNP, have declined and will continue to decline into the foreseeable future, thereby weakening China's ability to mobilize resources for modernization.

Revenue reforms can contribute to more inclusive, green, and sustainable growth in China. Relative to OECD economies, fiscal policy in China is less redistributive. Options for promoting more inclusive growth include improving the progressivity of labor taxes (individual income tax and social security contributions), introducing a recurrent property tax, and finishing the transition to a comprehensive value-added tax. Higher environmental taxes, meanwhile, would promote more environment-friendly economy. These reforms could also significantly boost revenue, potentially by as much as 6½ percent of GDP. Such increases in revenue could help reduce the deficit, finance priority social and infrastructure spending, and offset cuts in other taxes. We illustrate how these revenue reforms could be part of a comprehensive fiscal package that achieves the needed consolidation in the (augmented) deficit and foster higher quality growth.

This is the first-ever book to provide a comprehensive analysis of Chinese social security reforms with a variety of views. It addresses issues such as what kind of social security system China should establish, how this system should be managed and financed, and how the transition from the old system to the new system can best be accomplished. The authors of the papers in this book include internationally renowned Chinese and Western social security experts (such as Martin Feldstein and Henry Aaron), Chinese policy makers, and scholars who have worked on Chinese social security for years.

The chapter on tax administration and legislative principles addresses the basic concepts that need to be observed in designing effective, equitable and efficient tax reform. The use of taxation as a policy tool and rights and obligations of taxpayers are also dealt with. The chapter on individual income tax provides a conceptual overview of a modern individual income tax system that the authors recommend as the longer-term framework for China's short and medium-term decisions on tax reforms. The chapter on enterprise income tax, taking into account China's intention to modernize the enterprise income tax system and replace the two current laws on enterprise tax with one law, discusses the building blocks of a modern system. The chapter on VAT and business tax develops a VAT design against the background of VAT models and sources of VAT law in other countries and addresses the desirability of VAT and business tax being merged. The chapter on China's WTO accession and tax reform discusses China's WTO-related obligations in the area of taxation.

China is now facing the challenge of designing and carrying out new reforms of its taxation system. This book covers a wide range of topics critical to China's future tax reform. Several prominent scholars and government officials have contributed papers which range from general tax issues to specific problem areas in tax policy design, implementation and legislation in China. The collaborative efforts between the Chinese and foreign scholars combine first hand knowledge of the current situation of China's tax reform with modern economic theory and methodology, and highlight key issues which are the focus of research on China's tax system today. Several papers also examine the linkages between tax reform and reforms in other areas in China, such as monetary and housing reforms, thus giving a more complete picture of the task ahead.

In this book Professor Roy Bahl traces the history of the 1994 tax reform in China and evaluates its impact. The 1994 reform was the most systematic and comprehensive restructuring of China's revenue system. It covered the country's tax structure, tax administration, central-provincial fiscal relations, and provincial-local fiscal relations. In a concluding chapter, he examines possibilities for continuing taxation reform in China. Only a scholar with Professor Roy Bahl's extensive experience as adviser to developing countries on tax reform could have written a book with such breadth and depth. This book should be required reading for all students of economic development, comparative fiscal systems, or the Chinese economy.