Comparing UK Tax Returns of Foreign Multinationals to Matched Domestic Firms

S-Tier
Journal: American Economic Review
Year: 2019
Volume: 109
Issue: 8
Pages: 2921-53

Score contribution per author:

8.043 = (α=2.01 / 1 authors) × 4.0x S-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

In this paper, I use confidential UK corporate tax returns data to explore whether there are systematic differences in the amount of taxable profits that multinational and domestic companies report. I find that the ratio of taxable profits to total assets reported by foreign multinational subsidiaries is one-half that of comparable domestic standalones. The majority of the difference is attributable to the fact that a higher proportion of foreign multinational subsidiaries report zero taxable profits. I document how the estimated difference is related to profit shifting and show that using accounting data leads to much smaller estimates of the difference.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:aea:aecrev:v:109:y:2019:i:8:p:2921-53
Journal Field
General
Author Count
1
Added to Database
2026-01-24