Tax cuts exposed as myth
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The perception of a widespread tax-cutting trend amongst the world's richest economies is overturned by figures which show that the tax burden has climbed steadily in almost all cases since 1980. The exceptions have been the Netherlands, where it has declined, and the UK and Germany, where the share of national output taken by taxes has been flat.
Preliminary estimates collected by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development show that 10 of its 24 member countries did reduce the ratio of taxes to gross domestic product last year.
But there had been more tax-cutting in 1995, with 14 countries (although not the UK) achieving a reduction.
The figures show that the tax take in the UK is in the bottom half of the range. New OECD members Mexico and Korea had the lowest ratios in 1996, at 16 and 23.2 per cent of GDP respectively, although the US and Japan are not much further ahead. By contrast, the Danish and Swedish governments take 51.9 per cent of GDP in tax, with Belgium and France not far behind. Britain occupied a mid-Atlantic ranking of just over 35 per cent.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments