Taxing Digital Platforms
The proliferation of digital services taxes (DSTs) in Europe is generally understood as a way for those countries to claim taxing rights over the profits of large digital platforms. Under prevailing norms of international income taxation, these large digital businesses had been able to avoid paying taxes in countries where they had no physical presence, even if they had many users in those countries. The rise of big tech has generated a set of regulatory and political challenges, and taxation is one of these challenges. This article argues that the adoption of DSTs is not only about the fair allocation of taxing rights, but also economic competition between the U.S. and the EU, anxiety over the effects of digital platforms on society, and antitrust concerns about the economic power of the tech giants. DSTs provide an interesting illustration of how tax scholarship grapples with a novel tax.
Andrew T. Hayashi and Young Ran (Christine) Kim, Taxing Digital Platforms, 26 Va. J. L. & Tech. 1, 2023.