Tax Justice Resources

Recommended Links

Tax Justice Network

The U.K.-based Tax Justice Network has a superb site that is updated daily and contains a wide range of resouces and links.

Tax Justice Network, USA

Canadians for Tax Fairness

A Canadian organization promoting fair and equitable tax policies.

Tax Justice Africa

A pan-Africa initiative focused on tax issues.

Global Financial Integrity

A major international research center and think tank.

Offshore Watch

A compendium of daily news articles on international tax issues.

Paradis Fiscaux et Judiciaires

French-language site Paradis Fiscaux et Judiciaires contains updated news and links to other related sites.

Global Witness

Global Witness has done path-breaking work on resource-related conflicts and corruption.

Books

Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and the Men who Stole the World

Nicholas Shaxson · Bodley Head, January 2011, ISBN 978 1 84792 110 9
This book has been called the best exposé of the tax evasion industry ever written. Shaxson explains the origins and modus operandi of the world's leading tax havens along with other opaque parts of the global banking system and why little has been done to shut them down, despite the enormous damage they cause to the economies of both developed and developing countries.

Africa’s Odious Debts: How Foreign Loans and Capital Flight Bled a Continent

Léonce Ndikumana and James Boyce · Zed Books Ltd., London and New York, 2011
Ndikumana and Boyce’s research shows that over half the money borrowed by African governments departs the continent in the same year, some of it ending up in private accounts of the same banks that provided the loans. Between 1970 and 2008, sub-Saharan Africa lost more than $700 billion to capital flight, far greater than the region’s debt of $175 billion. The human costs of these lost resources are devastating; the authors calculated that debt service payments on loans that fuelled capital flight have resulted in more than 75,000 additional infant deaths annually in the sub-Saharan region.

Offshore: Tax Havens and the Rule of Global Crime

Alain Deneault · The New Press, New York, 2011
Montreal-based sociologist Alain Deneault describes a global base of operations from which massive criminal enterprises and corrupt corporations operate freely and with impunity, menacing developing nations and advanced democracies alike.

Capitalism’s Achilles Heel, Dirty Money and How to Renew the Free-Market System

Raymond Baker · John Wiley & Sons, 2005
Raymond Baker, Director of Global Financial Integrity in Washington, describes how offshore banks are used to hide stolen money and the proceeds of crime and used by drug cartels to launder their earnings. However, the majority of funds passing through tax havens are international corporate transactions. Corporations use these offshore mechanisms to facilitate tax evasion by assigning costs in high tax jurisdictions and profits in low tax jurisdictions. Baker has become one of the world’s leading advocates for reform of the global financial system.

The Blood Bankers

James Henry · Four Walls Eight Windows, New York, 2003
Economist James Henry provides an excellent overview of corrupt dictators and the mainstream banking system that has colluded in hiding stolen assets.

Videos

Canadian Videos

Professor Neil Brooks on the use of tax havens by Canadian corporations and on income inequality and poverty in Canada.

Articles

Taxes and the Common Good, Citizens for Public Justice, 2011.

A very good overview of the Canadian tax system.

How Banks, Brokers and the Financial Industry Can Pay Fairer Taxes

A 2011 paper arguing that the Canadian financial sector should pay more in taxes.

Tax Fairness, National Union of Public and General Employees

Important facts about taxation in Canada.

Five reasons to say no to more corporate tax cuts

A 2011 challenge to the Canadian government strategy of corporate tax reductions.

Corporate Income Taxes, Profit, and Employment Performance of Canada’s Largest Companies,

Canada's largest corporations are making 50% more profit and paying 20% less tax than they did a decade ago.

Pirate Bankers and the Shadow Economy,

An article linking international and Canadian tax avoidance and evasion issues.

A Different Sort of Tax Revolt, Toronto Star

An article about the Uncut movement in the United Kingdom.

The Real Pirates of the Caribbean

A general discussion of international and Canadian tax issues.

Les banques canadiennes et l'évasion fiscale dans les paradis fiscaux : 16 milliards de dollars d'impôts éludé

Université du Québec à Montréal. An 2008 article (in French) examining tax evasion by the five major Canadian banks.

Towards Unitary Taxation of Transnational Corporations

A campaign launched by Tax Justice Network proposing that TNCs be taxed on the basis of where actual economic activity takes place. Currently, TNCs can shift profits to shell companies in low tax jurisdictions to avoid tax. A unitary approach would eliminate the use of these artificial accounting tactics.

Analysis and Action on Policies Impacting Africa

Association of Concerned Africa Scholars, Fall 2012. An excellent set of articles on the problem of illicit capital flight from Africa.

The Price of Offshore Revisited

This 2012 research report from Tax Justice Network estimates that $21 to $32 trillion of global private financial wealth has been invested tax free through the world’s secrecy jurisdictions as of 2010. This is equivalent to the annual output of the US and Japan combined. These figures raise serious questions about current estimates of national income, debt ratios, and inequality.

Global Shell Games: Testing Money Launderers’ and Terrorist Financiers’ Access to Shell Companies

Given the central role of shell companies in corruption, terrorism and money laundering, the authors investigated how easy it is to establish anonymous shell companies in different jurisdictions. They found that it is easier to establish shell companies in countries such as the USA, the UK and Canada than in well-known tax havens. Griffith University, 2012.

Exposing the lost billions: How financial transparency by multinationals on a country by country basis can aid development

An excellent overview of how the cross border nature of multinational companies’ operations combined with the absence of adequate transparency regulations have very damaging implications for a country’s ability to mobilize domestic resources. EURODAD, 2011.

Illicit Financial Flows from Africa: Hidden Resource for Development

This analysis found that total capital flight from Africa between 1970 to 2008 was $854 billion. However, this is a conservative estimate and the total could be as high as $1.8 trillion. Global Financial Integrity, March 2010.

Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries: 2000 to 2009

This study found that average annual illicit outflows from developing countries averaged $725 billion to $810 billion annually over the 2000-2008 period. Trade mispricing accounted for more than half of illicit flows. Global Financial Integrity, Jan. 2011.

EURODAD FACT Sheet on capital flight

An overview of capital flight and the development impact on Southern countries.

The Big Tax Return

A general overview by Christian Aid (UK) of the role of taxation in developing countries.

Global Corporate Taxation and Resources for Quality Public Services, 2011

An overview of corporate tax avoidance/evasion and the impact on public services.

The Cost of Tax Evasion, 2011.

An estimate of the size of shadow economies by country and the extent of tax avoidance/evasion relative to health spending.

Closing the Floodgates: Collecting Tax to Pay for Development.

An excellent overview of the tax justice agenda. Tax Justice Network, 2007.

A Guide to Tax Work for NGOs

A good overview of the type of taxes, tax policy and how NGOs can be involved in monitoring government tax policies and administration.

Corporate lobbying and taxes in the US

US corporations spend more on lobbying than they do on taxes.

Tax and Sustainability: A Framework for Business and Socially Responsible Investors

Written for socially responsible investors.

Taxing Issues: Responsible Business and Tax

Taxes and corporate social responsibility.

The Business Case for Making Tax a Corporate Social Responsibility Issue

An article by Action Aid on tax and corporate social responsibility.

Smoke and Mirrors: Corporate Social Responsibility and Tax Avoidance

Accounting professor Prem Sikka argues that the practice of CSR has largely excluded tax issues.

Breaking the Curse, Taxes and Mining in Africa

A good report by Christian Aid (UK).

Extractive sectors and illicit financial flows: What role for revenue governance issues?

Resource rich countries are among the most serioulsy affected by illicit financial outflows. This paper argues that governance must be strengthened and improved.

An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Adopt a Financial Transactions Tax

An excellent argument for the adoption of a financial transaction tax. KAIROS, Canada, 2010

Mirror Mirror on the Wall, Whose the Most Corrupt of All?

John Christensen of the Tax Justice Network argues that both the demand and supply sides of corruption need to be addressed.

The Puppet Masters

"How the Corrupt Use legal Structures to Hide Stolen Assets and What to do About It," a report from the World Bank and the Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative.

Can tax challenge bad governance?

A paper that argues that taxation generates stronger state-citizen relationships than aid or revenues from natural resources.

Supporting Developing Countries’ Ability to Raise Tax Revenues

This paper discusses the domestic and international constraints on developing countries’ ability to raise taxes.

Tax Troubles: How TNCs Enhance Profits by Avoiding Taxes

Peter Gillespie · Third World Resurgence, December 2012
An article outlining how trans-national corporations use creative accounting methods to avoid paying taxes.

Educational Resources

Tackling Tax Havens

A website explaining the impact of tax havens on economies of both Northern and Southern countries. Includes a video.