Directions For State Tax Reform

CONTENTS

Preliminaries
Cover, Copyright, Preface, Contents, Abbreviations, Glossary, Executive Summary

PART A ASSESSING REFORM OPTIONS

1 Scope of this study

2 The State tax mix
2.1 Main areas of taxation
2.2 Interstate differences in the tax mix
2.3 Conclusion

3 A framework for assessing State taxes
3.1 Efficiency
3.2 Equity
3.3 Administration and compliance costs
3.4 Stability of the tax base
3.5 Conclusion

4 An assessment of State taxes
4.1 Efficiency
4.2 Equity
4.3 Administration costs
4.4 Compliance costs
4.5 Stability of the tax base
4.6 Summary

5 Options for Reform
5.1 Improving existing State taxes
5.2 Changing the tax mix
5.3 Going beyond current State tax bases

PART B DETAILED ASSESSMENTS

6 Payroll Tax
6.1 Overview
6.2 Assessment

7 Taxes on Land
7.1 Overview
7.2 Assessment

8 Financial Taxes
8.1 Overview
8.2 Financial institutions duty
8.3 Bank account debits tax
8.4 Marketable securities duty
8.5 Loan security duty
8.6 Where to from here?

9 Franchise Fees
9.1 Overview
9.2 Petroleum products
9.3 Tobacco
9.4 Liquor

PART C APPENDICES

A Tax assignment in a federation
A.1 Introduction
A.2 Models of tax assignment
A.3 Practical considerations
A.4 Summary

B Measuring the effeciency of State Taxes
B.1 Different measures of efficiency loss
B.2 A partial equilibrium measure of marginal excess burden
B.3 Extensions to the basic model

References