The tax system of Pakistan continues to under-perform, in particular, in its ability to raise adequate revenues. The bases of the most important taxes, such as Personal and Corporate Income Tax and the General Sales Tax (GST), continue to be narrow and the level of tax evasion remains high. Moreover, in recent years, the Tax-to-GDP (Gross Domestic Product) ratio has seen a substantial decline. On the other hand, most of the macroeconomic fiscal adjustment in recent years has been on the expenditure side of the budget. The country's need for spending on social services such as education, health, and capital infrastructure are likely to increase in the near future as governments pursue a strategy of sustained economic growth. Most political manifestoes brought forward by political parties spell out major expenditure programmes while expressing a desire to increase tax collection. To reach the desired taxation level in Pakistan, an in-depth policy reforms programme needs to be formulated by policymakers. This will require a detailed analysis of tax structures and tax administration. An attempt has been made in this book to provide the necessary analysis.

The Role of Taxation in Pakistan's Revival

Martinez-Vazquez, Jorge

Cyan, Musharraf Rasool

Tax Law

Oxford University Press

In the preface to this report, it is asserted that, 'history hovers... over any discussion of fiscal federalism in Russia.' This report not only reviews that history, but also follows it to the present situation with respect to the difficult policy choices facing the new Putin-led government, and neatly links Russia's choices with the broader issues facing any country undergoing intergovernmental reform. Thus, the authors weave into the discussion the dynamics of Russia's options with respect to deciding who delivers what services and how to finance these services with the question of the fiscal politics of change, or the intergovernmental and inter-regional balancing and counterbalancing of power. Furthermore the authors tie these questions together with those of how to implement good governance: should it be piecemeal or unified, asymmetric or uniform, and centrally driven or locally controlled?This book is the third in a series of World Bank books on fiscal decentralization in Russia and the transition economies. This volume is a companion volume to the previous two books, 'Russia and the Challenge of Fiscal Federalism' (1994) and 'The Decentralization of the Socialist State' (1995). It explores many of the same themes in a wider country and comparative context, with a richer empirical base than was possible in those early works.

Russia's Transition to a New Federalism (Wbi Learning Resources Series)

Business & Money

Boex, Jameson

Economics

World Bank

Scholars and practitioners have long hailed fiscal federalism as a critical tool for improving government services, but it has not always lived up to its promise when applied in specific countries. This book offers both an explanation for such mixed effects and a roadmap for better outcomes in the future. It argues that the benefits of fiscal federalism are contingent on a particular confluence of political institutions, namely democratic decentralization and political party integration.
 With this in mind, the authors emphasize the importance of striking a ''fine balance'' between the accountability benefits delivered by empowered local governments and the national coordination necessary for good policy outcomes. Such a balance can be achieved, they contend, when integrated party structures compensate for the potential downsides of a decentralized state. The book formalizes this argument for a variety of electoral democracies and, using new data on subnational political institutions, tests it with models of education, health, and infrastructure service delivery in 135 countries across 30 years. It also presents comparative case studies of Senegal and Nigeria.
 Academic economists and political scientists will value the book for its contribution to the literature on fiscal federalism and political decentralization, and development practitioners will benefit from its practical solutions to the problems of local governance.

Local Accountability and National Coordination in Fiscal Federalism: A Fine Balance (Studies in Fiscal Federalism and State-local Finance series)

Hankla, Charles R.

Ponce Rodríguez, Raúl A.

Edward Elgar Publishing

Book by Martinez-Vazquez, Jorge, Rider, Mark, Wallace, Sally

Tax Reform in Russia

Wallace, Sally

Rider, Mark

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Books by Martinez-Vazquez, Jorge