IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org//p/unu/wpaper/wp-2019-10.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Combatting debt bias in South African firms: The case for an allowance for corporate equity

Author

Listed:
  • Seppo Kari
  • Londiwe Khoza
  • Nangamso Manjezi
  • Kyle McNabb

Abstract

The problem of debt bias can be tackled through either disincentivizing the use of debt financing or incentivizing the use of equity financing. Considering the South African context—in which many firms are highly leveraged and the marginal effective tax rates for using debt financing are significantly lower than those for equity financing—this study explores the case for introducing an allowance for corporate equity.

Suggested Citation

  • Seppo Kari & Londiwe Khoza & Nangamso Manjezi & Kyle McNabb, 2019. "Combatting debt bias in South African firms: The case for an allowance for corporate equity," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2019-10, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2019-10
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp-2019-10.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), 2016. "The Effects of Tax Reforms to Address the Debt-Equity Bias on the Cost of Capital and on Effective Tax Rates," Taxation Papers 65, Directorate General Taxation and Customs Union, European Commission.
    2. Devereux, Michael P & Griffith, Rachel, 2003. "Evaluating Tax Policy for Location Decisions," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 10(2), pages 107-126, March.
    3. Ernesto Zangari, 2014. "Addressing the Debt Bias: A Comparison between the Belgian and the Italian ACE Systems," Taxation Papers 44, Directorate General Taxation and Customs Union, European Commission.
    4. Finke, Katharina & Heckemeyer, Jost H. & Spengel, Christoph, 2014. "Assessing the impact of introducing an ACE regime: A behavioural corporate microsimulation analysis for Germany," ZEW Discussion Papers 14-033, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    5. aus dem Moore, Nils, 2014. "Corporate Taxation and Investment: Evidence from the Belgian ACE Reform," Ruhr Economic Papers 534, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    6. Duncan Pieterse & Elizabeth Gavin & C. Friedrich Kreuser, 2018. "Introduction to the South African Revenue Service and National Treasury Firm‐Level Panel," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 86(S1), pages 6-39, January.
    7. Tibor Hanappi, 2018. "Corporate Effective Tax Rates: Model Description and Results from 36 OECD and Non-OECD Countries," OECD Taxation Working Papers 38, OECD Publishing.
    8. Marco Carreras & Purnachandar Dachapalli & Giulia Mascagni, 2017. "Effective corporate tax burden and firm size in South Africa: A firm-level analysis," WIDER Working Paper Series 162, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    9. Ruud A. De Mooij, 2012. "Tax Biases to Debt Finance: Assessing the Problem, Finding Solutions," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 33(4), pages 489-512, December.
    10. Hebous, Shafik & Ruf, Martin, 2017. "Evaluating the effects of ACE systems on multinational debt financing and investment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 131-149.
    11. Kari, Seppo & Laitila, Jussi & Ropponen, Olli, 2018. "Investment Incentives and Tax Competition under the Allowance for Growth and Investment (AGI)," Working Papers 110, VATT Institute for Economic Research.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Spengel, Christoph & Heckemeyer, Jost Henrich & Nusser, Hannah & Klar, Oliver & Streif, Frank, 2016. "The impact of tax planning on forward-looking effective tax rates," ZEW Expertises, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, volume 64, number 148155, September.
    2. Nicola Branzoli & Antonella Caiumi, 2020. "How effective is an incremental ACE in addressing the debt bias? Evidence from corporate tax returns," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 27(6), pages 1485-1519, December.
    3. Bofinger, Peter & Schnabel, Isabel & Feld, Lars P. & Schmidt, Christoph M. & Wieland, Volker, 2015. "Zukunftsfähigkeit in den Mittelpunkt. Jahresgutachten 2015/16 [Focus on Future Viability. Annual Report 2015/16]," Annual Economic Reports / Jahresgutachten, German Council of Economic Experts / Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung, volume 127, number 201516.
    4. Ligia Alba Melo-Becerra & Javier Ávila Mahecha & Jorge Enrique Ramos-Forero, 2017. "The Effect of Corporate Taxes on Investment: Evidence from the Colombian Firms," IHEID Working Papers 10-2017, Economics Section, The Graduate Institute of International Studies.
    5. European Commission, 2019. "Tax Policies in the European Union: 2020 Survey," Taxation Survey 2020, Directorate General Taxation and Customs Union, European Commission.
    6. Petutschnig, Matthias & Rünger, Silke, 2017. "The effects of a tax allowance for growth and investment: Empirical evidence from a firm-level analysis," arqus Discussion Papers in Quantitative Tax Research 221, arqus - Arbeitskreis Quantitative Steuerlehre.
    7. Sean Mc Auliffe & Georg U. Thunecke & Georg Wamser, 2023. "The Tax-Elasticity of Tangible Fixed Assets: Evidence from Novel Corporate Tax Data," CESifo Working Paper Series 10628, CESifo.
    8. Dhammika Dharmapala, 2016. "The economics of corporate and business tax reform," Working Papers 1604, Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation.
    9. Tibor Hanappi & Ana Cinta González Cabral, 2022. "The impact of the international tax reforms under Pillar One and Pillar Two on MNE’s investment costs," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(6), pages 1495-1526, December.
    10. Alessandro Zeli, 2018. "The impact of ACE on investment: the Italian case," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 35(3), pages 741-762, December.
    11. Toshiyuki Uemura, 2023. "Corporate Tax Increases and Shareholder-Level Capital Income Tax Neutrality in Japan -An Analysis of Fundamental Reforms Using Effective Tax Rates-," Discussion Paper Series 257, School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University.
    12. Hebous, Shafik & Ruf, Martin, 2017. "Evaluating the effects of ACE systems on multinational debt financing and investment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 131-149.
    13. Sebastian Beer & Mark Griffiths & Alexander Klemm, 2023. "Tax distortions from inflation: What are they? How to deal with them?," Public Sector Economics, Institute of Public Finance, vol. 47(3), pages 353-386.
    14. Ligia Alba Melo-Becerra & Javier Ávila Mahecha & Jorge Enrique Ramos-Forero, 2021. "Corporate Taxation and Investment: Evidence from a Context of Frequent Tax Reforms," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 237(2), pages 3-31, June.
    15. Thomas von Brasch & Ivan Frankovic & Eero Tölö, 2021. "Corporate taxes, investment and the self-financing rate. The effect of location decisions and exports," Discussion Papers 955, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    16. Sijbren Cnossen, 2016. "Tackling Spillovers by Taxing Corporate Income in the European Union at Source," CPB Discussion Paper 324.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    17. Hebous, Shafik & Ruf, Martin, 2017. "Evaluating the effects of ACE systems on multinational debt financing and investment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 131-149.
    18. Amina Ebrahim & Rebone Gcabo & Lilian Khumalo & Jukka Pirttilä, 2019. "Tax research in South Africa," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2019-9, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    19. Sijbren Cnossen, 2016. "Tackling Spillovers by Taxing Corporate Income in the European Union at Source," CPB Discussion Paper 324, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    20. Toshiyuki Uemura, 2021. "Evaluating Japan's Corporate Income Tax Reform using Firm-specific Effective Tax Rates," Discussion Paper Series 226, School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2019-10. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.