The third mechanism that was identified earlier through which companies
seek to avoid tax is through artificial financial arrangements. Again, there
should be a commitment not to use such arrangements in order to reduce the
company’s tax burden, unless there was a non-tax related reason for doing so.
A responsible tax strategy involves not only taking steps to ensure that the
company does not engage in tax avoidance, but also requires a high level of
transparency. This includes not only transparency in payments made, as is
required, for example, by the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, but
could be extended to reporting on a country-by-country basis.
Tax avoidance is not the only negative aspect of corporate behaviour that
affects government fiscal revenues. The pressure to reduce tax rates in order to
attract investment which governments are often subject to from multilateral
development institutions, and the broader context of ‘tax competition’ between
countries, also undermine the ability of governments to obtain adequate fiscal
resources. Contrary to current practices, corporate responsibility would involve
a company agreeing not to lobby or pressure host governments to provide it
with more favourable tax treatment. This might be consistent with the increasing
emphasis within CSR on ‘responsible lobbying’.
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There are of course limitations on the use of CSR as a means of dealing with
tax avoidance. Many of these are similar to those which have been noted in
relation to other aspects of CSR. First of all, where particular strategies are central
for a company’s profitability, they are particularly difficult to change in
order to bring practice into line with the rhetoric. Companies which at present
make extensive use of tax avoidance and have large numbers of subsidiaries
located in tax havens may find altering their strategies particularly costly. As
with all voluntary codes, the failure of some companies to add such standards
creates a ‘free rider’ problem, with laggards who continue to practice tax avoidance
gaining a competitive advantage vis-à-vis those companies which adopt
more stringent standards. Restraint in terms of not exploiting loop-holes, even
where legally it might be permissible to do so, would need to be exercised by
leading TNCs to show the way and generate pressure on others to conform.
The fact that public pressure puts some companies in the spotlight more than
others means that the application of voluntary measures tends to be uneven.
Most of the companies whose tax avoidance strategies have attracted
widespread attention have tended to be those supplying consumer goods and
having a direct relationship with the public.