The tax system of OECD countries and main recommendations from the Organisation: Parameters for a tax reform in Brazil by Pedro Humberto Bruno de Carvalho Junior published by Ipea (2022).
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) was founded in 1961 to foster economic development and global trade through multilateralism, promoting democracy and market economy values. Currently, it has 38 Member States and deliberates on various issues, including taxation. Evidently, this does not mean that Member States have similar tax policies: on the contrary, the countries are quite different from each other (including in terms of income) and, therefore, have distinct tax systems. The role of the OECD includes cataloguing the policies and data of each Member State’s tax system, providing general recommendations around tax policy, such as, for example, Brys (2011), Brys et al. (2016), Johansson et al. (2008), and O’Reilly (2018), as well as specific tax recommendations for the crises of 2009 (OECD 2010) and 2019 (OECD 2021a). Member States must make this information available to the OECD and can choose whether or not to follow the entity’s recommendations. It is important to highlight that there has been a gradual shift through time of the OECD’s recommendations on tax policy, from the defence of a simplified and harmonious tax system that would not hinder economic growth (Brys 2011, Johansson et al. 2008, OECD 2006a, 2006b, 2006c, 2007, 2010) to a more inclusive and progressive one (OECD 2021a, 2021b, 2018a, 2018b). For example, the entity went from having a stance that was against net wealth taxes, which had been abolished in many European countries in the 1990s and 2000s (Johansson et al. 2008, OECD 2004, 2006b), to even considering more extensive taxation on the wealth and capital gains of millionaires (OECD 2018a, 2018b, 2021b), especially after the COVID-19 pandemic (OECD 2021a).
