UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES HO CHI MINH CITY THE HAGUE VIETNAM THE NETHERLANDS VIETNAM – NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS IMPACT OF ECONOMIC VOLATILITY ON CORPORATE INCOME TAX RATE: THE CASE OF 20 ASIAN COUNTRIES MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS BY TRUONG HOANG YEN Academic Supervisor Dr. NGUYEN HOANG BAO HO CHI MINH CITY, JANUARY 2015 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES HO CHI MINH CITY THE HAGUE VIETNAM THE NETHERLANDS VIETNAM – NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS IMPACT OF ECONOMIC VOLATILITY ON CORPORATE INCOME TAX RATE: THE CASE OF 20 ASIAN COUNTRIES A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS By TRUONG HOANG YEN Academic Supervisor Dr. NGUYEN HOANG BAO HO CHI MINH CITY, JANUARY 2015 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT This paper examines the impact of economic volatility on the corporate income tax rate in the context of globalization and international taxation competition. The impact is analyzed by two models, direct and indirect effect model.
The former investigates directly the relationship of corporate income tax rates and economic volatility in terms of real interest rate, exchange rate, and growth rate. The latter applies a system of equations to examine simultaneously the determinants of tax rate and tax base. The study finds out that economic volatility impacts negatively on corporate income tax rate and also negatively on foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows. Moreover, corporate income tax rate affects negatively and significantly on FDI inflows, meanwhile FDI inflows influence corporate income tax rate with positive and significant impact.
LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION. Research objectives and research questions. The structure of research. 5 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW.
Roles of corporate income tax rate. Foreign direct investment. Corporate income tax rate. Employment rate and demographic structure of population.
Personal income tax rate. 24 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER THREE: ECONOMIC VOLATILITY AND CORPORATE INCOME TAX: DESCRIPTIVE AND DATA ANALYSIS. Measurement of economic volatility. Measurement of corporate income tax rate.
Measurement of capital openness index. Summary of variables description and data sources. 29 CHAPTER FOUR: METHODOLOGY AND RESULTS. 48 CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS.
Limitations and suggestions for further study. 57 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. 78 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1 Average top statutory corporate income tax rate in 20 Asian countries.2 FDI inflows in 20 Asian countries .1 Corporate income tax rate, capital openness index and FDI inflows (1982-2011) .2: Corporate income tax rate, Real interest, Exchange rate, Growth volatility, and FDI inflows (1982-2011) .1 Direct effect framework .3 Method for Direct effect model .2 Indirect effect framework .4 Method for Indirect effect model.52 LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1 Variables description and data sources .1: List of variables in direct effect model .2: Direct approach in various methods with interest rate volatility .3: GMM estimation with and without volatility in three proxies .4: List of variables in indirect effect model .5: Indirect approach with interest rate volatility through various estimators .53 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1. Problem statement Taxation is the major source of government revenues for funding public expenditure, such as infrastructure, education, public health, and other social investment programs.
Governments adjusted their taxation policies to facilitate economic growth (Barro, 1991; Bleaney, Gemmell, and Kneller, 2001). On the purpose of providing an economic environment to foster economic growth, corporate income tax plays a crucial role in the taxation system, especially an important part in tax reform (Arnold et al. Corporate income tax serves the economy with three vital functions. Firstly, the corporate income tax rate is regarded as an effective way to raise tax revenues.
Secondly, corporate income tax is popularly perceived as fair charges for public goods and services consumed by companies. Lastly, corporate income tax is considered as a reasonable substitute for personal income tax. Because it is hard to administer personal tax on capital income, especially the gains which are retained in a company (Bird, 1996; Devereux and Sørensen, 2006). In high tax rate countries, governments have to allow some profit shifting because of tax competition from lower tax rate countries (Becker and Fuest, 2012).
Therefore, governments also restrain that process by competing in reducing the effective average tax rate and statutory tax rate (Devereux, Lockwood, and Redoano, 2008). During the period from the 1980s to the late 1990s, the average corporation tax rate decreased from nearly 40% to around 30%, specifically, in the European countries from 38% in 1990 to 33% in 2000 (De Mooij and Ederveen, 2003; Devereux et al.1 presents the dramatic downturn of average top statutory tax rate on corporate income of 20 Asian countries from more than 40% in 1982 to approximated 25% in 2011. Different from European countries, Asian countries decrease their statutory corporate income tax rate roughly after 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. The highest rate of statutory corporate income tax is 60% in Pakistan in 1989 whereas the lowest one is 12% in Macau from 2005 to 2011.
In 2011, policy makers in Pakistan reduce this variable to 35%, nearly 50% reduction. This may imply a serious competition on corporate income tax rate between these countries for recent three decades (Devereux et al. 40 Corporate tax rate (%) 35 30 25 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 Year Source: Author’s collected dataset Figure 1.1 Average top statutory corporate income tax rate in 20 Asian countries In order to attract more capital inflows, governments compete each other by reducing corporate income tax rate (Genschel and Schwarz, 2011), because a corporate income tax rate rise conducts to a decline in multinational investment (Hong and Smart, 2010). As illustrated in Figure 1.2, the inward FDI volume is increasing sharply and significantly.
From the roughly zero initial level in 1982, FDI inflows increase approximately to the landmark of 200 billion US dollars in 2011. Despite the crises in 1997 and 2008, this tendency still continues over time. The combination of downward trend in corporate income tax rates and upward tendency in capital inflows illustrates the tax competition among countries for the purpose of capital attractiveness. 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 200 150 100 50 0 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 Year Source: UNCTAD (2014) Figure 1.2 FDI inflows in 20 Asian countries From another point of view, economic volatility is believed as a determinant of tax reform (Feldstein, 1976).
It is considered as disincentive for investments because it distorts the location decision for investments to other stable economy instead of the volatile one. In order to stimulate FDI inflows, the corporate income tax rates have to be kept at a sufficient low level in order to reduce costs of capital and enhance investment incentives (Panteghini and Schjelderup, 2006). Consequently, the corporate income tax setting process is influenced by economic volatility (Ghinamo, Panteghini, and Revelli, 2010). An enormous number of researches study tax competition among jurisdictions.
However, there is a lack of study investigating the tax competition under the impact of economic volatility. This subject is examined in the theoretical study of Panteghini and Schjelderup (2006), and the empirical studies of Slemrod (2004) as well as Ghinamo et al. These studies contribute to the theoretical framework of timing choices in the investment decisions of multinational enterprises. This 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com framework is regarded as the plausible explanation for the corporate income tax rate setting process under the influence of economic volatility.
Moreover, these studies also involve the effect of globalization on the relationship between corporate income tax rate and economic volatility. Besides, the framework of timing choices in the investment decisions of multinational enterprises is employed to illustrate the mechanism of capital mobility. Under the motivation from the works of Panteghini and Schjelderup (2006) and Ghinamo et al. (2010), this research investigates the relationship of the top statutory tax rates on corporate income and economic volatility in terms of real interest rate, nominal exchange rate, and GDP growth rate.
This relationship is also examined with consideration of influences from globalization in terms of FDI flows and capital market openness. The highlight of the paper is that the lag effects of public policies and investment decisions are taken into account. Research objectives and research questions This study aims to investigate the corporate income tax rate setting process in scope of 20 Asian countries from 1982 to 2011. The process is examined under the impact of economic volatility in terms of real interest rate, nominal exchange rate, and growth.
Moreover, this impact is also assessed in the context of globalization, in particular, capital mobility in terms of FDI inflows into the country. Based on these objectives, the goals of the study are to answer the following questions: - Does economic volatility, in terms of real interest rate, nominal exchange rate, and growth, affect corporate income tax rates? - How is the influence of FDI inflows on the relationship between economic volatility and corporate income tax rates? o Does economic volatility affect FDI inflows? o How do FDI inflows influence corporate income tax rates and vice versa? 4 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. The structure of research The research consists of five chapters. The first chapter presents the introduction which points out the main objectives and the scope as well as the time period of the research.
The second chapter covers the literature review, which is composed of theoretical framework as the foundation of the study and empirical works on specific variables involved in the investigation in the research. Measurements for each variables and data analysis are discussed in the third chapter. The fourth chapter presents the analytical framework of the study and shows the particular models with their applied methods as well as the results for each model. Based on the results obtained in the previous chapter, the fifth chapter demonstrates the findings and limitations of the research.
It also suggests the future directions and implications for policy makers. 5 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW The theoretical literature section introduces the roles of corporate income tax rate, economic volatility, and tax competition through various studies to illustrate the mechanism of their relationship. Afterwards, the relationship between corporate income tax rate, economic volatility, and FDI. Then the empirical literature section synthesizes numerous studies on economic volatility, corporate income tax rate, and FDI inflows as well as control variables.
This section aims to point out the benchmarks for the coming empirical models. Roles of corporate income tax rate Corporate income tax rate is analyzed under three functions. Firstly, corporate income tax rate is regarded as an effective way to raise tax revenue without affecting economic behavior. Corporate income tax is designed to charge on economic profits, particularly on economic rents with particular investments.
However, this function is only effective in a closed economy. In case of existing capital mobility, the choice for location of investments is distorted by high tax rates. Therefore, Mintz (1995) concluded that the high tax rates may cause a company to change their location of investments to another jurisdiction with lower tax rate. Secondly, corporate income tax is perceived popularly as fair charges for public goods and services consumed by companies.
The government provides public supplies such as infrastructure and other public investments. These supplies create a better economic environment in order to foster the economic growth. To fund the public investment, according to Bird (1996), government levies on the profits of companies at a fair share of tax for the value of public goods and services the companies consumed. 6 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.