2025

This briefing paper examines the taxation challenges posed by the rise of cross-border services in an increasingly globalized and digital economy. Traditional tax rules, based on physical presence, fail to account for the borderless nature of modern service provision, leading to loopholes and tax avoidance. The paper discusses how these challenges have gained prominence in international tax reform efforts, including the G20/OECD BEPS initiatives and the push for a UN Tax Convention. It argues for a dedicated protocol to govern the taxation of cross-border services, identifying key gaps in existing tax frameworks and proposing core features for a prospective UN-led solution.

This article critiques the current U.S. system for taxing corporate distributions, highlighting its complexity, bias favoring buybacks over dividends, and opportunities for tax sheltering. Despite repeated reform efforts, the system remains flawed. The authors propose a "distributions tax impossibility theorem," demonstrating that no tax regime can equally treat buybacks and dividends while taxing capital gains on realization under current legal assumptions. They suggest two reforms to address these issues: repealing classification rules so that payout forms dictate tax treatment, and treating all dividends as partial sales, building on Ethan Yale’s 2009 proposal. These reforms aim to neutralize the tax bias between buybacks and dividends, simplify the system, and minimize sheltering opportunities.

This article explores the relationship between the Undertaxed Profits Rule (UTPR) and international tax treaties, focusing on how the UTPR affects their application and interpretation. It discusses the digital transformation’s impact on global taxation and the BEPS Project’s role in addressing these challenges. The article provides an overview of the UTPR, including its evolution, objectives, and implementation across jurisdictions, as well as the fundamentals of international tax treaties under the OECD Model Convention. The analysis highlights potential conflicts, discriminatory effects, and treaty override concerns arising from the UTPR, while evaluating the multilateral instrument's role and dispute resolution mechanisms. Practical implications for multinational enterprises, particularly U.S. MNEs, are examined, alongside policy recommendations and domestic legislative strategies for effective UTPR implementation.

This article examines tax sovereignty as the ability of a political community to design a fiscal system that supports its collective self-determination, emphasizing that sovereignty is rooted in legitimate authority rather than mere power. It explores the challenges globalization poses to tax sovereignty, particularly its impact on the state’s capacity to provide public goods, promote distributive justice, and uphold political participation. The article warns that globalization, if unchecked, could erode substantive tax sovereignty and questions how states can maintain viable and legitimate tax systems in a competitive global environment. It concludes by evaluating cooperative measures, arguing that such cooperation must prioritize leveling the international tax playing field and progressively allocating its benefits to sustain substantive tax sovereignty.

This article discusses the integral role of tax in advancing sustainable development goals (SDGs) and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) frameworks, emphasizing the shared responsibility of governments and businesses in achieving sustainability. It argues that corporate tax governance should align with an organization's sustainability commitments, values, and principles, with sustainable tax practices being a board-level priority. Companies dedicated to SDG and ESG objectives should expand upon corporate social responsibility (CSR) principles, recognizing an ethical obligation to pay a fair share of tax and maintain proactive transparency to enhance accountability. Key challenges include fostering a mindset shift to integrate tax into ESG frameworks and developing a public transparency benchmark that provides detailed tax data for analyzing corporate tax performance effectively.