Theory and Practice of Local Tax Reform from International Comparative Viewpoint

本研究旨在从国际比较的角度，分析20世纪70年代以后美国、英国、瑞典，以及韩国、台湾地区地方税改革的理论与实践的回顾与前景。世界主要国家的改革的共同特点是，由于财政危机，中央政府减少了对地方政府的拨款，迫使地方政府自筹资金。由于改革的主要理念不是以公平原则为基础，而是以资源配置效率为主要目标，因此英国的社区收费等改革在实施过程中遇到了严重的困难。这一改革的主要类型有三种：（1）在资产税中引入量入为出的思想，拒绝引入人头税等效率导向的地方税制度。(2)从公平的角度来看，土地资产所有权的巨大差距是最关键的，因此，在地方税收体系中引入资本利得税是必要的。(3)在地方税体系中引入地方所得税或增值税来替代传统的财产税，世界各国都在探索理想的地方税改革，包括上述三种类型。

This research aims to analyze the retrospect and the prospect in the theory and practice of local tax reform after 1970s from international comparative viewpoint including not only United States of America, United Kingdom, and Sweden, but also Republic of Korea and Taiwan. The common feature of the reform in major countries is that the reduction of the amount of the grant from central government because of financial crisis enforces local government to raise their own resources. Since major idea of the reform is not based on the equity principle but mainly on the efficiency of resource allocation, some of the reform such as community charge in United Kingdom has faced serious difficulty to put in force. The major three types of the reform are as follows :(1) Introducing the idea of the ability to pay principle into asset tax, rejecting the introduction of efficiency oriented local tax system such as poll tax.(2) Since from equity point of view, a great disparity of the ownership of land asset is the most crucial, capital gain tax should be introduced in the local taxation system.(3) Local income tax or value-added tax should be introduced into local taxation system instead of the traditional property tax.All of the countries has been doing a search for ideal local tax reform including three types mentioned above.