The OECD has reported in an email briefing this morning that:
In 2018, four OECD countries had tax-to-GDP ratios above 43% (France, Denmark, Belgium and Sweden) and four other EU countries also recorded tax-to-GDP ratios above 40% (Finland, Austria, Italy and Luxembourg). Five OECD countries (Mexico, Chile, Ireland, the United States and Turkey) recorded ratios under 25%.
There’s one thing to note first, and that is that Ireland’s GDP is massively overstated by the flow of foreign profits through it: the impact may be overstatement by more than 25%, in which case the noted tax ratio is also wrong and the real like-for-like figure would have Ireland above 30%.
Then I will pose a simple question: which would you rather live in? France, Denmark, Belgium, Sweden, Finland, Austria, Italy and Luxembourg, or Mexico, Chile, the USA and Turkey?
And where would you feel safer?
And in which country would your human rights be better protected?
And now, why would you want to drive tax yield and the size of government down?
It’s really not rocket science that tax is good fo9r wellbeing, is it?
Richard Murphy
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