Lessons from Tax Reforms in the Asia-Pacific Region

The period since the late 1970s has been characterized by a series of economic reforms, including tax reforms, in countries with a wide variety of economic systems and income levels. There now appears to be a general consensus, particularly among the countries in the Asia-Pacific region, concerning broad economic policies to bring about sustained economic growth with low to moderate levels of inflation. It centers around the need for conservative macroeconomic policies; the importance of building external economic linkages through trade, investments and other devices; the importance of infrastructure and human resource development; enhancing the capacity of the government and the public sector to effectively design and implement policies but in a narrower range of activities than earlier; and the concomitant increase in the use of the market as an instrument to tackle economic problems…