Inclusive fiscal reform: ensuring fairness and transparency in the international tax system

In recent years, international taxation has received significant public and scholarly attention, and has been high on the international policy agenda. In this context, the work of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has been central in reforming the international tax system. This paper is based on the keynote address delivered to the 2017 International Institute of Public Finance Annual Congress on 18 August 2017 in Tokyo by David Bradbury of the OECD, and highlights the OECD’s global tax agenda and how it can advance inclusive fiscal reform. The paper covers three major areas of the OECD’s work. First, it reviews the advances made by the OECD/G20 Base Erosion and Profit Shifting project to reduce BEPS, and the ongoing work to address the tax challenges of digitalisation. Second, it reviews the initiatives involving the exchange of taxpayer information, and the development of new standards on Automatic Exchange of Information and Exchange of Information on Request by the OECD. Finally, the paper considers how these international initiatives provide policymakers with more domestic tax policy options and recommendations on how tax systems can be better designed to achieve inclusive growth.