Kluwer Fiscale en Financiele,The Netherlands – förlag

Modern society cannot function without a high level of investment, just as it cannot function without a high level of taxation (or its equivalent in communist countries). Both investment and taxation (as a source of government revenue) are important for the level of production and employment. No wonder then that governments are faced with an increasing dilemma between higher taxation on the one hand and the need for stimulating investment by tax reductions or allowances on the other. Related to this is the choice between a market economy which is as free as possible and detailed governmental measures for monitoring and steering investments, not only with the intention to promote economic growth but to further a nu mb er of other social interests as weil. This is to some extent a political issue but the decisions it involves should still be based on sound economic facts and considerations. In many countries one of the important instruments for stimulating and steering investment is the introduction oi\modification of investment incentives within the framework of the tax system. The present book gives a lot of information on this subject. It endeavours to create a conceptual order in the somewhat chaotic multitude of incentives practised by the main industrial countries and studies their economic effects. The authors are weil equipped to do this because they were c10sely involved in the study on this subject made by Erasmus U niversity Rotterdam at the request of the Common Market Com­ mission.

The law and practice in this work is that at 10th] anuary 1978. To complete this work in Autumn 1977, as originally intended, was impossible. Principally, this has been due to the changes in the Finance Act 1977, the various mini budgets and the exchange control changes, many of which are relevant to the subject matter of this work. Gratitude is expressed to the publishers for their patience. The Revenue has just revised its useful practice notes, IR 25 1977, dealing with the taxation of foreign earnings. The new IR 25 1977 modifies only slightly the IR 25 in Appen­ dix4. It will be appreciated that in this work it is impossible to provide for exhaustive treatment of all the taxes. Complexity in some places has been set aside for simplicity and clarity. Any such selectivity consisting of various emphases and omissions rests solely on fallible judgment. It is hoped that some light nevertheless is cast on the basic facets relevant to migrants. Too often these facets are not dealt with appropriately, dealt with separately without any co-ordination or submerged in a plethora of exotic detail of interest to academics and theoreticians only. Further reading is suggested in the Bibliography. Many thanks for assistance, constructive suggestions and encouragement are due (in no particular order) to Dr. J. Barry Bracewell-Milnes of Erasmus University Rotterdam, Dr. Nico Nobel of Nobel & Van WierstBV, Dr. Albert Radler, Edode V ries of Gray's Inn and] eremy Lamb of Comprehensive Financial Services.

If investment in the EEC countries has been the major preoccupation of the international business community in the 1960's, contracting in the Arab states seems to become one of the major trends of the 1970's. The need for multicountry business and tax information was felt simultane­ ously. Language difficulties, scarcity of legal and other sources, distance and, most of all, the novelty of business expansion in this direction made such information still more necessary than in the European or inter­ American setting. A few symposiums were held, corporate and tax laws were translated, research studies were initiated, among which the book of Mr and Mrs SIIILLING on Doing Business in Saudi Arabia and the Arab Gulf States, a rich mine of general business information. I was therefore very pleased when Mrs CLERIN, completing her tax studies at Ecole Superieure des Sciences Fiscales in Brussels, mentioned that she was going to live in the Middle East, had the opportunity to work with a well-known international accounting firm and proposed to focus her final dissertation at the School on the tax planning of operations in Arab countries. She devoted months of research to the study of sources both in Middle East and in industrial­ ized Western countries, to come up with a true planning study, clear, readable and practical. The description of the tax and corporate structure of the operating territories will be found in the first half of the book.

Corporate income taxation in the Netherlands Antilles is embodied in a law of a total of 57 articles, i.e. Articles" 1 to 54 and Articles 8A, 9A and 14A. The law is divided into nine chapters. Chapter I (Articles 1 to 16) contains the substantive portion of the law and Chapters II to IX are the procedural articles, the penal sanctions, transistory and effectivity provisions. Articles 8A, 9A, 14 and 14A are the Articles which substantially regulate the taxation of off-shore or non-resident companies. It should be noted however, that all the other articles of the law together with additional legislation, e.g. Guaranty Law of 1969, (exept when specifically excluded) are likewise applicable to off-shore com­ panies. Thus, rules on allowable and allocable deductions, loss carry forward, assessment and collection are identical for both off-shore and on-shore companies. It is a tribute to the legislators who drafted and enacted the present law and the officials who execute it that two totally divergent taxation regimes work in acceptable harmony. History and Background Prior to the introduction of the law on corporate income taxation in 1940, there existed one law on personal income and on profits of entities, regulated in the Income Tax law of 1906.