This is the third edition of Tax Policy Reforms: OECD and Selected Partner Economies, which is an annual publication that provides comparative information on tax reforms across countries and tracks tax policy developments over time. The report covers the latest tax policy reforms in all OECD countries, The report includes all OECD countries as at 1 January 2018. as well as in Argentina, Indonesia and South Africa.

With monetary policy starting to return to normal in many countries, support provided by fiscal policy, including to a large extent through tax policy, has become more significant. Many countries have eased their fiscal stance to stimulate the economy by lowering taxes, increasing government spending, or both. This year’s report highlights that the focus of the most recent tax reforms has been on cutting taxes on businesses and individuals with a view to boosting investment, consumption and labour market participation, continuing a trend that started a couple of years ago.

The year 2018 saw the entry into force of significant tax reforms in Argentina, France, Latvia and the United States. The focus of these reforms has largely been on supporting investment, through lower corporate taxes but also through changes in taxes on property and personal capital income. Some elements of these reforms are also aimed at enhancing fairness by lowering taxes on low and middle-income earners. However, none of these reforms are expected to be revenue-neutral. In addition, Belgium has introduced a comprehensive corporate income tax (CIT) reform, combining a significant reduction in the CIT rate with substantial base broadening.

This chapter gives an overview of the main macroeconomic trends up until 2017. The purpose of this overview is to provide background information to help understand tax revenue trends as well as tax policy changes. Tax policy reforms are closely connected with economic trends: tax revenues are affected by changes in macroeconomic conditions and economic trends themselves are key drivers of tax reforms.

This chapter describes tax revenue trends – looking at both total tax-to-GDP ratios and tax mixes – in OECD countries, Argentina, Indonesia and South Africa. The analysis covers tax revenue trends until 2016, the latest year for which comparable tax revenue data is available. This overview of tax revenue trends is useful to understand the effects of past tax policy reforms and sets the stage for the subsequent discussion on the tax reforms that were recently introduce

This chapter provides an overview of the latest tax reforms in OECD countries, Argentina, Indonesia and South Africa. It identifies the most significant tax reforms that were introduced as well as common tax policy trends across groups of countries. It looks at trends in each category of tax separately, including personal income taxes and social security contributions, corporate income taxes, VAT/GST and excise duties, environmentally related taxes and property taxes.