scholarly journals The Digital Services Tax on the Verge of Implementation

2019 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
pp. 1135-1152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Cui

France enacted the digital services tax (DST) in 2019, and similar legislation is pending in the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, and other countries. The DST can be viewed as a tax on location-specific rent (LSR), and it arguably solves genuinely new problems in international taxation. The author briefly reviews this justification of the DST and further examines the DST design in light of three criticisms. The first criticism is that certain features of the DST render it similar to distortionary import tariffs. The second is that the DST would not be borne by digital platforms but would only be shifted to platform users. The third is that governments promoting the DST seem not to characterize it as a tax on LSR but, instead, have advocated reforming the income tax. The author suggests ways of rationalizing the DST's tariff-like features, refutes casual arguments about the DST's incidence, and offers a framework for understanding why small economies might advocate simultaneously for the DST and for the reformation of international income taxation.

Author(s):  
John Chandler ◽  
Elisabeth Berg ◽  
Marion Ellison ◽  
Jim Barry

This chapter discusses the contemporary position of social work in the United Kingdom, and in particular the challenges to what is seen as a managerial-technicist version of social work. The chapter begins with focus on the situation from the 1990s to the present day in which this version of social work takes root and flourishes. The discussion then concentrates on three different routes away from a managerial-technicist social work: the first, reconfiguring professional practice in the direction of evaluation in practice, the second ‘reclaiming social work’ on the Hackney relationship-based model and the third ‘reclaiming social work’ in a more radical, highly politicised way. Special attention is devoted to a discussion about how much autonomy the social workers have in different models, but also what kind of autonomy and for what purpose.


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (11) ◽  
pp. 2041-2050 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danielle Mitchell ◽  
Nathan Critchlow ◽  
Crawford Moodie ◽  
Linda Bauld

Abstract Introduction From May 20, 2017, cigarettes in the United Kingdom must be sold in standardized (plain) packaging. We explore postimplementation reactions to standardized cigarette packaging among never-smokers in Scotland, whether reactions vary in relation to permitted variations in pack structure, and whether reactions are associated with susceptibility. Aims and Methods A cross-sectional survey with 12–17-year-old never-smokers (n = 507) in Scotland, conducted November 2017–November 2018. Participants were shown one “regular” standardized cigarette pack (flip-top lid and straight-edged pack, similar to designs in Australia) and three standardized packs with varied pack structures (beveled-edges, slim pack, and shoulder box), which are permitted postimplementation in the United Kingdom. Participants rated each pack on eight five-point reaction measures (eg, attractiveness). Participants also indicated which pack, if any, they would choose. Smoking susceptibility was the outcome. Results The mean reaction scores for all four packs were mostly negative, however the shoulder box was consistently rated less negatively than the regular, slim, or beveled-edge packs. Most participants (87%) said they would not select any of the four packs, although susceptible participants were more likely to select one than nonsusceptible participants (25% vs. 7%; χ 2 = 29.70; p < .001). For all four packs, not finding them off-putting was associated with susceptibility (Adjusted Odds Ratio range: 2.73–3.69), albeit only a minority of adolescents did not find each pack off-putting. Conclusions Adolescents have negative reactions to the standardized cigarette packs implemented in the United Kingdom, albeit permitted variations in structure can reduce the extent of negativity. Most reactions to standardized packaging had no association with susceptibility. Implications We provide the first empirical evidence that adolescents find the standardized cigarette packs implemented in the United Kingdom unappealing and that most pack reactions have no association with susceptibility among never-smokers, with the exception of the minority who did not think that they would put them off smoking. This suggests that the legislation is achieving one of its primary aims, to reduce the appeal of packaging. That permitted variations in pack structure (eg, shoulder boxes) somewhat reduce negative reactions suggests that the United Kingdom, and other countries introducing similar legislation, should ensure that all aspects of pack design are fully standardized.


1946 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-78
Author(s):  
A. H. Shrewsbury

‘If there be one point free from obscurity in the Act of 1842 it is this, that the Legislature intended all traders, whether in groceries, annuities or other articles of commerce, to be assessed upon the same footing.’ Lord Watson in The Gresham Life Assurance Society υ. Styles.The main object is to discuss principles and therefore many points of detail will be omitted, however intrinsically interesting they may be. Satisfactory consideration of principles entails reference to all classes of business which involve an actuarial valuation (viz. life assurance and annuity business, sinking fund business and permanent sickness insurance business). Reference will be made to the National Defence Contribution and the Excess Profits Tax, which are based upon income-tax legislation. The subject in mind is the relation of such taxation to insurance business and funds of the classes mentioned, as distinct from other aspects of income tax which an insurance office encounters, and it will be considered solely from the point of view of an office established in the United Kingdom which transacts business only in the United Kingdom. In view of the paper by Messrs S. J. Rowland and F. H. Wales on ‘The Taxation of the Annuity Fund’ (March 1937, J.I.A. Vol. LXVIII), only brief reference will be made to annuity business, and it will be assumed that it is unnecessary, in describing taxation processes, to include explanations or qualifying phrases on account of annuity business.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-87
Author(s):  
Stephanie Medden

This article describes how Latin American advocacy and activist groups operating in the United Kingdom engage in identity work through their collaboration with one another, the creation of discourses around cultural identity and the division of activist labour. By examining how the members of these groups plan their strategies, collaborate and use digital platforms to perform and construct identity, mobilize support and partner with ally groups, the author sheds light on some ways in which identity movements facing the threat of geopolitical shifts, such as Brexit, participate in identity work under precarious conditions. This article demonstrates how a bifurcation of activist labour represents two different but concurrent approaches to identity work for Latin American activists in post-Brexit Britain. It argues that such precarity challenges the primacy of Latinidad as a strategic resource for activists and, instead, encourages alternative forms of solidarity.


Subject Prospects for Europe in the third quarter. Significance For the rest of June and the third quarter, the EU will grapple with the future positions within the bloc of two member states, the United Kingdom and Greece. The period will see the resolution, one way or another, of the immediate crisis in Greece's relations with its international creditors. The way in which this takes place will have profound implications for the future of the single currency.


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