International Tax Law

This Second Edition provides an updated and succinct, yet highly informative overview of the key issues surrounding taxation and international law from Reuven Avi-Yonah, a leading authority on international tax. This small but powerful book surveys the nuances of the varying taxation systems, offering expert insight into the scope, reach and nature of international tax regimes, as well as providing an excellent platform for understanding how the principles of jurisdiction apply to tax and the connected tools that are used by countries in imposing taxes. It includes new material on BEPS, the EU Anti Tax Avoidance Package, and the US Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

In this fresh, objective, and non-argumentative volume in the Elements of International Law series, Peter Hongler combines a comprehensive overview of the technical content of the international tax law regime with an assessment of its crucial relationship to wider international law. Beginning with an assessment of legal principles and foundations, the book considers key general principles, treaty based regimes, and regional integration in tax matters. In the second half of the work Hongler places international tax law in the context of its wider relationships with human rights law, and trade and investment law. He concludes by considering major legal successes and failures and what might be done to address these.

This book is a comprehensive, up-to-date treatise on income tax law in Canada. The book introduces students and practitioners to income tax law in its broadest dimensions. It addresses the subject matter based on principles, policy, and practice. The objective is to explain what the law is, why it is the way it is, and how it works (or does not).

In an age when cross-border business transactions are increasingly effected without the transference of physical products, revenue concerns of states have led to a multitude of tax disputes based on the concept of ‘nexus’. This important and timely book is the most authoritative to date to discuss one of the major tax topics of our time – the question of how taxing rights on income generated from cross-border activities in the digital age should be allocated among jurisdictions. Demonstrating in prodigious depth that it is the economic nexus of the tax entity or activity with the state, and not the physical nexus, which meets the jurisdictional requirement, the author – a leading authority on this area who is a Senior Commissioner of Income Tax and a Member of the Dispute Resolution Panel of the Government of India – addresses such dimensions of the subject as the following: whether a strict territorial nexus as a normative principle is ingrained in source rule jurisprudence; detailed scrutiny of such classical doctrines as benefit theory, neutrality theory, and internation equity; comparative critique of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and United Nation (UN) model tax treaties; whether international law and customary principles mandate a strict territorial link with the source state for the assumption of tax jurisdiction; whether the economic nexus-based tax jurisdiction and absence of a physical presence breach the constitutional doctrine of extraterritoriality or due process; and whether retrospective tax legislation breaches the principle of constitutional fairness. The book offers a politically informed analysis of the nexus principle and balances the dynamics of physical presence and economic nexus standards, based on an in-depth survey of the historical evolution of judicial pronouncements and international practices in this regard. Dr Singh’s book exposes an urgently needed missing link in the international source rule literature and takes a giant step towards solving the thorny question of appropriate tax apportionment. It sheds brilliant light on the policies states may adopt when signing new tax treaties, so that unintended results may be foreseen and avoided. Tax practitioners, taxation authorities, and academic researchers in the field of international tax law and policy will greatly appreciate the book’s forthright enhancement of the ability to defend challenges based on the nexus doctrine.

Explains why perfecting, rather than curbing, interstate competition would make international taxation both more efficient and more just.

"Switzerland has recently witnessed an unprecedented level of tax treaty negotiations. Although this is a direct result of Switzerland's revised position regarding exchange of information, a number of contracting states have taken this opportunity to modify tax treaty benefits and/or clarify certain aspects of tax treaty interpretation and application. These are considered extensively in this edition. As Switzerland has steadily aligned itself with international principles of international taxation, the self-imposed anti-abuse rules for the application of tax treaties have become less relevant. Nevertheless, Swiss courts have become more creative in determining where there is and where there is not treaty abuse. As a result, the 1962 Abuse Decree is making way for a more complex basket of anti-abuse rules and regulations"--Foreword (page vii).

Time is a crucial dimension in the application of any law. In tax law, however, where an environment characterized by rapid change on the national, European, and international levels complicates the provision of accurate legal advice, timing is particularly sensitive. This book is the first to analyse the relationship between time and three key areas of tax: treaties, EU law, and constitutional law issues, such as legal certainty and individual rights. Among the numerous timing issues arising out of applying tax rules, the book addresses the following: – time limits within which relief must be requested; – statutes of limitation for claiming a tax refund; – transitional issues relating to changes in tax treaties; – attribution of profits and expenses to a moving or closed-down business; – effect of tax-related CJEU decisions and EU directives; – compliance of exit tax regimes with free movement; – limits of retroactivity under principles protected by the EU Charter and the ECHR; and – conflict between efficiency of taxation and individual rights. Derived from a recent conference organized by the prestigious ATOZ Chair for European and International Taxation at the University of Luxembourg, the book brings together contributions from leading tax experts from various areas of tax practice, academia, and the judiciary. Among other issues, the book notably expands on how economic theory can inform a constitutional analysis of the timing of taxation. There is no other work that concentrates so usefully on the difficulties associated with applying tax rules – whether arising from treaties, jurisprudence, or policy – to changing circumstances over time. This book will quickly prove itself to be an indispensable resource for European tax lawyers, policymakers, company counsels, and academics.