4th Annual *Global* Tax nd Inequality Conference

Assistant Secretary Fernandez is on foreign travel in New Delhi, India through December 9 to participate in meetings on infrastructure and to deliver keynote remarks at the Fourth International Tax Dialogue (ITD) Global Conference on Tax and Inequality.

From their website:
In cooperation with the International Tax Dialogue, India is very pleased to be hosting the 4th ITD Global Conference on Tax and Inequality. This conference provides a unique and timely opportunity to address to what extent taxation can be seen as part of the solution to growing inequalities in income and wealth.

The use of plenary and parallel sessions, with active country participation, allows a peer dialogue between Ministers of Finance and Heads of Revenue Administration around the world. Issues addressed include:

-Design of growth-enhancing and equitable tax systems
-Administrative challenges, issues and solutions for fair tax systems
-Income taxes, progressivity and inequality across regions
-Fair tax systems: vital for state-building and an exit from aid dependency
-Informality, inequality and the role of the tax systems
Gender friendly tax systems and inequality
-Taxation of elites and inequality

This is a high level conference, with senior level representation from over 100 countries expected to attend. A number of prominent academics and representatives of regional and international organizations will be also present at the conference.

http://www.itdweb.org/TaxInequalityConference/Pages/Agenda.aspx

Day 0 - Tuesday, 6 December 2011

19:00

WELCOME RECEPTION – Hotel Le Meridien

Day 1 - Wednesday, 7 December 2011

10:00-10:30

I. CONFERENCE OPENING – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

§ Pranab Mukherjee – Finance Minister, India

§ Min Zhu – Deputy Managing Director, IMF

§ Wang Jun – Vice-Minister of Finance, China

§ S. S. Palanimanickam – Minister of State for Finance, India

10:30-12:00
II. Inequality: MAIN TRENDS AND CHALLENGES – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

The opening session will review trends in poverty and inequality, outline the drivers behind these trends, and the intense fiscal constraints that many countries face in coming years. It will cover:

§ Globalisation trends and their impact on inequality within and between countries

§ Fiscal pressures facing developed and developing countries

§ Sharing the benefits of growth – national trends and regional differences

Chair:
Kaushik Basu – Chief Economic Advisor, Ministry of Finance, India

Speakers:
Carlo Cottarelli – Director, Fiscal Affairs Department, IMF

Ajay Chhibber – UNDP Assistant Administrator and UN Assistant Secretary-General

12:00-12:30

Coffee Break

12:30-14:00

III. TAXES AND INEQUALITY – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

In this session the speakers will give an overview of the main tax issues that impact on inequality that will be discussed during the course of the conference, and are also addressed in the conference background paper.

§ Tax structure and inequality: impact of variations in the former on the latter

§ Incidence questions

§ Tax and growth

§ Regional differences

§ Differences across country income levels

§ Consumption taxes versus direct taxes—evidence on distributional impacts

§ Administration in support of equality

§ Taxation and aid dependence

§ Gender, skills, age, inequality and taxation

Chair: Otaviano Canuto – Vice-President, World Bank

Speakers:
Jeffrey Owens – Director, Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, OECD

Anita Kapur – Director General of Income Tax (Administration), Ministry of Finance, India

Ivan Pillay – Deputy Commissioner, Revenue Service, South Africa

14:00-15:00

Lunch Break

15:00-16:15

IV. INCOME TAXES AND INEQUALITY: REGIONAL EXPERIENCES – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

This session will look at recent changes in inequality trends in different regions and the extent to which tax was a driver of change and/or has responded to these changes. It will pay particular attention to why the Latin American experience has been so different from that of other countries and regions at similar (varying) levels of development.

§ Further issues for discussion will include:

§ Do progressive rate schedules work to reduce inequality? How?

§ Are differences in the structural characteristics of economies important in determining the mix of direct and indirect taxes?

§ Distinguishing between labour and capital income; types of capital income

§ Corporate income tax—what is its incidence? Impact of taxation of multinationals on inequality?

§ Real impact of exemptions and incentives on equity

Chair: Maciej Grabowski – Undersecretary of State, Ministry of Finance, Poland
(Presidency of the Council of the European Union)

Speakers:
Jorge Martinez-Vazquez – Professor of Economics, Georgia State University, US

Juan Pablo Jimenez – Economic Affairs Officer, UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC)

Barfour Osei – Chief Research Economist, Networking and Research Partnership Division (EDRE.2), Development Research Department (EDRE), African Development Bank (AFDB)

Cyn-Young Park – Assistant Chief Economist, Asian Development Bank (ADB)

16:15-16:45

Coffee Break

16:45-18:00

V. PARALLEL SESSION – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre

Session 1: CONSUMPTION TAXATION AND INEQUALITY, Room 5

SESSION 2: TAXATION OF SMALL BUSINESS AND FAIRNESS, Room 6

This session will look at the distributional issues around VAT and excises:

§ Is rate differentiation warranted in developing countries where transfers are harder to provide via other government bodies? Is an effective method of redistributing income?

§ Excises: alcohol, tobacco, fuels - what is their tax incidence on the poor? How important are other objectives such as health and environmental issues in comparison?

Topics in this session will cover:

§ Dealing with small business - do solutions

differ across countries, and should they?

§ Informality

§ Measuring the tax gap

§ Taxing professionals

Chair: Donato Raponi – Head of Unit, Taxation and Customs Union, European Commission

Speakers:
Parthasarathi Shome – Director and Chief Executive, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), India

Alberto Barreix – Principal Fiscal Economist, Inter-American Development Bank

Carlos Gerardo Acevedo Florez – President of the Central Bank, El Salvador

Amadou Bâ – Commissioner General, Revenue Authority, Senegal


Chair: Horacio Justo Curien – Deputy Director General of Planning, Federal Administration of Public Revenues, Argentina

Speakers:

Michael Engelschalk – Senior Revenue Policy and Administration Expert, World Bank

Fabrizia Lapecorella – Director General of Finance, Ministry of Economy and Finance, Italy

Rajit Punhani – Commissioner, Bihar Tax Department, India

Abdellatif Zaghnoun – Commissioner General, Ministry of Finance, Morocco

19:30

Conference Dinner


Day 2 – Thursday, 8 December 2011

09:30-11:00

VI. TAX ADMINISTRATION, POVERTY AND INEQUALITY – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

This session provides an overview of the impact of administrative challenges, issues, and solutions on the results for inequality of tax systems in both developed and developing countries. Topics include:

§ Revenue administration as state building; “tax morale” and “tax morality”—practical implications? Are these concerns an important intermediate step to achieving fairer tax systems?

§ Coping with capital flight—impacts

§ The personal income tax in low income countries—coverage in practice versus in law

§ International cooperation in matters of information reporting related to overseas income

§ Integration of personal income tax and social contributions—impact on inequality and progressivity

Chair: Marcio Verdi – Executive Secretary, Inter-American Center of Tax Administrations (CIAT)

Speakers:
Mostafa M. Abdel Kader – Head of the Central Department of International Tax Treaties, Tax Authority, Egypt

Roberto Cavazos Flores – Administrator of Federal Fiscal Planning and Programming, Tax Administration Service, Mexico

Allen Kagina – Commissioner General, Revenue Authority, Uganda

M. C. Joshi – Chairman Central Board of Direct Taxes, Ministry of Finance, India

11:00-11:30

Coffee Break

11:30-13:00

VII. PARALLEL SESSIONS – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre

SESSION 1: GENDER, TAXATION AND INEQUALITY, Room 5

Session 2: LABOUR MOBILITY, TAXATION AND EQUALITY, Room 6

This session will look at the impacts of taxes on gender inequality. Topics covered will include:

§ Taxation of second earners: the impact of current tax regimes

§ Family versus individual taxation

§ Microenterprise and gender issues

§ Incentives to alleviate gender pay differentials

This session will focus on mobility of labour and taxation and inequality. Discussions will cover:

§ Role of remittances

§ Migrants

§ “Brain drain” and taxation

Chair:
Jennifer Morel – Revenue Commissioner, Revenue Commission, Seychelles

Speakers:
Vicky Perry – Head of Tax Policy Division, Fiscal Affairs Department, IMF

David Nguyen-Thanh – Senior Economist, Public Policy of the Governance and Democracy Division, GIZ

Mick Moore – Founding Chief Executive Officer, International Centre for Tax and Development, United Kingdom

Chair: Manjari Kacker – Member (P&V), Central Board of Direct Taxes, Ministry of Finance, India

Speakers:
Jean-Luc Schneider – Deputy Director, Economics Department, OECD

Blanca Moreno-Dodson – Lead Economist, World Bank Group –

Valerica Epure – Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Romania to India, Romania

13:00-14:00
Lunch Break

14:00-15:30
VIII. PARALLEL SESSIONS – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre
Session 1: REAL PROPERTY TAX AND INEQUALITY, Room 5

Session 2: DEALING WITH LOW INCOME TAXPAYERS, Room 6

Very few countries, outside industrial Anglophone countries, raise significant amounts of tax revenue from real property taxes despite their theoretical appeal in terms of efficiency. This session will discuss the prospects of significant increase of this source of revenue as part of a more equitable tax structure:

§ Asset rich but low income taxpayers – how should they be viewed from an equity perspective?

§ Administering property taxes – How are valuation issues best dealt with?

§ Property tax and lower tier governments – who should decide tax rates?

This session will focus on discussion of how best to interact with and collect tax from those on low incomes. Issues covered will include:

§ The role of withholding systems

§ Thresholds for personal income tax

§ Administrative and compliance issues around filing

§ Paid preparers: friends or foes?

§ Revenue agencies as “welfare agencies”

§ Impacts on informality

Chair: Celia Pablos Salgado – Director of Public Finance School, Ministry of Economy and Finance, Spain

Speakers:
Cristina Arango – Secretary of Urban Planning for Bogota, Colombia

Patrick Kassera – Commissioner, Domestic Revenue Department, Revenue Authority, Tanzania

Luis Porto – Vice-Minister of Economy and Finance, Uruguay

Pascal K. Abinan – Director of Fiscal Administration, Côte d'Ivoire


Chair: Habiba Louati – Commissioner General, General Direction of Fiscal Studies and Legislation, Ministry of Finance, Tunisia

Speakers:
David Richardson – Director, Specialist Personal Tax, HM Revenue & Customs, United Kingdom

Kakha Baindurashvili – President of Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Former Minister of Finance, Georgia

Celestin Bumbakare – Commissioner for Domestic Taxes, Revenue Authority, Rwanda

James Brumby – Manager, Public Sector Governance Group, World Bank

15:30-16:00

Coffee Break

16:00-17:30

IX. PARALLEL SESSIONS – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre

SESSION 1: WEALTH AND INHERITANCE TAXES, Room 5

SESSION 2: A MORE DETAILED LOOK AT TAXES AND GROWTH, Room 6

This session will focus on the policy and administrative issues raised by wealth and inheritance taxes. Topics addressed will include:

§ Experience with wealth and inheritance taxes

§ Interaction with capital gains and other taxes

§ Use and potential in developing countries

§ Public acceptability

This session will explore the potential efficiency costs of moving to more equitable tax structure in terms of the impact different taxes can have on a country’s economic growth. The session will explore:

§ Lessons from the academic and empirical literature on the links between tax and growth

§ Differences between developed and developing countries

§ The impact of inequality on growth: are there threshold effects?

Chair: Roger Schjerva – State Secretary, Ministry of Finance, Norway

Speakers:
Christian Valenduc – Senior Advisor, Federal Public Service of Finance, Belgium

Jean-Marc Fenet – Deputy Director General of Public Finance, France

Edwin Visser – Deputy Director General, Tax & Customs Policy and Legislation; and Director for International Tax Policy and Legislation, Ministry of Finance, Netherlands

Chair:
Masatsugu Asakawa – Deputy Vice- Minister for International Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Japan; and Chair of the OECD Committee of Fiscal Affairs (CFA)

Speakers:
Christopher Heady – Professor of Economics, University of Kent, UK

Michael Waweru – Commissioner General, Revenue Authority, Kenya

Winston Dookeran – Minister of Finance, Trinidad and Tobago

19:00
Conference Dinner – Hotel Le Meriedien

Day 3 – Friday, 9 December 2011

09:30-10:45

X. HIGH NET WORTH INDIVIDUALS, TRANSPARENCY AND INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION – Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

This session will bring together some of the international tax issues that impact on tax and inequality via international channels. Topics that will be discussed in this session will include:

§ International cooperation among revenue administrations

§ High income labour mobility and taxation

§ Role of tax havens

§ Capital flight

§ Tax evasion and avoidance

§ Information reporting/withholding

§ Impact on lower income countries

Chair:
Pascal Saint-Amans – Head of Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes, Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, OECD

Speakers:
Vito Tanzi – Former State Undersecretary for Economy and Finance, Ministry of Economy and Finance, Italy and former Director, Fiscal Affairs Department, IMF

Wendy Martin – Director of Tax Policy, Treasury and Resources Department, States of Jersey

Mark Konza – Deputy Commissioner, Australian Taxation Office, Australia

K. V. Chowdary – Director General of Income Tax (Investigation) New Delhi, Ministry of Finance, India

10:45-12:15

XI. PARALLEL SESSIONS - Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre

SESSION 1: INTERACTION OF TAX AND AID, Room 5

SESSION 2: INTERGENERATIONAL ASPECTS OF INEQUALITY, Room 6

This session will explore the impact of international aid efforts on domestic revenue mobilisation, and the indirect effect it may have on tax and inequality. Issues to be addressed include:

§ Impact on revenue effort of international aid and transfers

§ Objectives of aid agencies – what are realistic goals in relation to tax and domestic revenue mobilisation?

This session covers the intergenerational equity issues which arise across within countries, and may be heavily affected by taxation. Issues covered in this session will include:

§ Impact of burgeoning deficits on intergenerational equity—pension and health care finance

§ Are the elderly richer or poorer than the young? How much social mobility takes place across generations? How does this differ across countries, and how has (or can) taxation influenced these outcomes?

§ Is it right to condition tax treatment on age? How should concerns about equity be reflected in the tax treatment of pensions?

§ Resource rich low-income countries—structuring government revenues from extraction to maximize generational equity

Chair: Young Rok Choi – Director General, Tax Analysis & International Tax Affairs, Ministry of Strategy and Finance, Korea

Speakers:

Jose Fernandez – Assistant Secretary of State, Economic, Energy and Business Affairs, United States

Sanjeev Gupta – Deputy Director in the Fiscal Affairs Department, IMF

Ajay Shah – Professor, National Institute for Public Finance and Policy, India

Chris Habeenzu – Director of Domestic Tax Division, Revenue Authority, Zambia


Chair: Mario Pezzini – Director, Development Centre, OECD

Speakers:
Michael Keen – Deputy Director, Fiscal Affairs Department, IMF

Anders Kristoffersson – Director of the Tax Policy Division and Deputy Head, Tax and Customs Department, Ministry of Finance, Sweden

Ismail Momoniat – Deputy Director-General, Economic Policy, National Treasury, South Africa

12:15-12:30

Coffee Break

12:30-14:00

XII.CLOSE OF CONFERENCE: LESSONS AND AGENDAS FOR STRONGER and FAIRER ECONOMIES

Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Main Hall

The closing session of the conference will bring together the conclusion from earlier plenary and parallel sessions. The panellists will discuss the national and international issues that have been raised and how they should be addressed.

Panel Discussion:

Chair: R. S. Gujral – Finance and Revenue Secretary, India

Speakers:
Maciej Grabowski – Undersecretary of State, Ministry of Finance, Poland (Presidency of the Council of the European Union)

Allen Kagina – Commissioner General, Revenue Authority, Uganda

Luis Porto – Vice-Minister of Economy and Finance, Uruguay

Ismail Momoniat – Deputy Director-General, Economic Policy, National Treasury, South Africa

Closing remarks:

Jose Fernandez – Assistant Secretary of State, Economic, Energy and Business Affairs, United States

Rintaro Tamaki – Deputy Secretary General, OECD

R. S. Gujral – Finance and Revenue Secretary, India

14:00-15:00


Lunch Break

15:00-16:00

IMPLICATIONS OF THE CONFERENCE CONCLUSIONS FOR THE FUTURE ITD WORK PROGRAM

Vigyan Bhawan Conference Centre, Room 5

The objective of this session is to exchange in more detail views on what the ITD, and its partners where appropriate, should do to follow up conference outcomes. It will explore the opportunities for enhanced co-operation with the work of bilateral donors in supporting demands from developing countries for assistance on conference related topics, and discuss in which areas resources could be most effectively used to deliver higher levels of domestic revenue mobilisation in a way which promotes equity and fairness.