Day: April 30, 2003

The best way to promote economic growth is to further reduce marginal income tax rates, says former U.S. Treasury Secretary James A. Baker III. He points to the success of President Reagan’s tax-rate reductions in the 1980s.

In 1980, the U.S. government claimed 70 cents out of every dollar of

by Garth Zietsman

The total earnings of the average South African taxpayer from 1 January to 21 April equalled the total taxes they have to pay for 2003. They have now spent only 7 days working for themselves and the other 111 days working to pay their taxes.

Identifying ‘tax freedom day’

The “living wage” movement in the United States supports local, state and even federal legislation to mandate a much higher minimum wage, presumably tied to the cost of living or the wage required to lift a one-earner family above the poverty level.

While some biased research shows that wage mandates have

A quarter of the world’s fisheries are on the brink of collapse because of over-fishing. The conventional wisdom says government-mandated restrictions will bring back depleted stocks. The answer is to adopt the same type of innovative policy that has been used for decades in the realm of pollution control: tradable

With the end of war, a key issue will be the Iraqi tax system. Under Saddam Hussein, sales from the state-run oil monopoly provided all the revenue that the government needed for what little it did. The interim authorities will need revenue to pay for police, fire-fighting and

The U.S. Senate wants to cut President Bush’s proposed tax cut package in half, but economists say that would be a mistake. Eliminating the double taxation of corporate dividends – first as corporate profits, then as income to investors – would provide an immediate and long-term stimulus, say economists