Tax professionals' view of the Spanish tax system: efficiency, equity and tax planning

Abstract

The design of a tax system is a daunting task. Economies have become increasingly complex, which makes the design of taxes has to take into account behavioral taxpayers' responses – including mobility -, but also tax planning issues. Additionally, increasing inequality trends put more pressure on design. This complex framework increases the need of complete and constantly updated information about the functioning of the system to carry out welfare-enhancing reforms and having stable sources of public funding. It seems now the moment the Spanish tax system takes advantage of all sources of information to undertake a necessary reform. For this ambitious purpose, we aim at providing a novel source of information: the (objective) opinion of tax professionals. From a survey all over Spain, tax professionals unanimously conclude the current tax system is unfair, while the main inefficiencies, rather than due to traditional responses, come out as a consequence of tax planning and tax mobility. We hope the complete results of the survey are a useful source of information.