H21 - Taxation and Subsidies: Efficiency; Optimal TaxationReturn

The article focuses on the new rules for electronic commerce that came into force on 1 July 2021 in all EU Member States. The main goal is to explain these new rules of taxation of consignments of goods from abroad (both from the European Union and third countries) to non-taxable persons and subsequently to calculate the impact of these new rules on the tax revenues of public budgets of the Czech Republic. The assumption set in advance is that the changes in tax legislation will result in an increase in the Czech public budget revenues due to the boosted revenues from value-added tax collected on foreign shipments. Year-on-year, tax revenues from online purchases will undoubtedly increase also due to the growing popularity of online shopping, currently sustained by the ongoing pandemic situation of covid-19. The calculations of the additional value-added tax revenue are based mainly on the data sourced from the Czech Statistical Office and a study carried out for the European Commission. The additional value-added tax revenue is calculated using the three model situations that assess impacts on the tax revenue of public budgets in the Czech Republic. For 2019, these impacts were estimated at between CZK 3.1 and CZK 6.1 billion.

Some of the European Union member states try to tackle the issue of CO₂ emissions generated by the transport sector through environmental registration taxes. The aim of the present research is to ascertain whether they use distorting and unfair parameters represented, in particular, by graduated progressive rates. Tax parameters consisting of average and marginal rates, taxes or nominal rates for 26,100 cases are calculated for various CO₂ emission levels in passenger cars. We determine the optimal shape of such parameters from the point of grades, shape and progression and we identify differences from the optimum in the monitored countries. It was discovered that from the 13 countries of the European Union that use vehicle registration tax on passenger cars based on CO₂ emissions, only Austria applies a tax that approximates the optimum. In five countries, we identified imperfections consisting of the graduated nature or local or global decrease in the rates examined. Registration taxes in the remaining countries are basically incompatible with the requirement of non-distortion. Even those taxes that do not generate significant revenues and are less socially sensitive, as is the case with the environmental registration tax, must be designed in a manner that is fair and non-distorting.

The transport sector is one of the important components of economic systems. Besides positive effects, it is also a source of external costs transferred to other entities. Through the evaluation of current settings of the tax base and parameters of the road tax rate progressivity it was ascertained that this tax fails to directly or indirectly reflect the external costs of transport. It is through a relatively simple adjustment of the existing road tax rates that indirect reflection of certain items of the road transport external costs may be achieved. Firstly, changes must be made in the definition of the road tax base so as to contain emissions or other parameters of externalities; subsequently, the direct reflection of the road transport external costs in the tax may be achieved.

This paper designs and tests a comprehensive model, solved by statistical simulation, which describes and quantifies the effect of the tax system and lifelong income characteristics on the effective tax burden of a population or its segment. In the present application the model is structured and calibrated to analyse the category of employed persons in the Czech Republic. The Czech tax and levy system is shown to be mildly progressive, with a steep digression for very high incomes. It is also shown how the initial income endowment, lifelong income volatility and the minimum wage level impact the structure of effective tax rates, as well as expected unemployment.

The contribution deals with issues of taxation of truck traffic in the Czech Republic and European Union countries. The article discusses the current need for the introduction of environmental features aiming at the mitigation of harmful substances emitted into the atmosphere to the system of truck traffic taxation. Within the tax system, we focus on the road tax mechanism, defining only those circumstances that relate to environmental features of the determination of the tax base or tax reliefs dependent on the compliance with the applicable EURO emission standard. The article outlines systems of truck taxation in the European Union member states with focus on the determination of the tax base. The EURO emission standard, which is clearly identified and binding upon all the truck producers at present, has been introduced as the environmental factor related to pollutants emitted to the atmosphere, and it subsequently assumes the role of a "green" feature of the road taxes on trucks in those EU countries which introduced such environmentally friendly aspects. A special section describes systems of road tax with environmental aspects levied on trucks in Bulgaria, Hungary, the Netherlands, Germany, Slovak Republic, Slovenia and Sweden. In conclusion, we mention the necessity of discussion over this topic in the conditions of the Czech Republic and the requirement to regulate the system of road taxes imposed on trucks, calling for reduction of harmful substances generated by traffic.

The aim of the paper was to analyze some behavioral effects, especially the effect of "hidden" tax, the "preference of progressivity" effect and some kind of "preference of short period incidence" effects of citizen. The effects predict the citizens will prefer hidden taxes to direct levies. The behavioral experiments revealed that additional information concerning the "hidden" tax and tax progressivity influences the preferences of respondents. They started to prefer the different ways of financing the public goods, those more progressive. Effect of "hidden" tax substantially diminishes after the prompting of information concerning the true tax incidence of corporate income tax. At the beginning the corporate income tax was preferred all over the groups, but later it lost its dominance and the alternative personal income tax became the favorable way how to finance of public goods. It is evident the relevant information concerning the real tax incidence and the redistributional effects of particular tax measures can significantly change the citizens view how to construct the preferred tax mix. It might also affect the process of political negotiation and reasoning.