Overview of tax havens and the use of tax havens by US taxpayers. The study sought to determine the frequency and nature of tax haven transactions, identify specific types of tax haven transactions, obtain a description of the US and foreign legal and regulatory environment in which tax haven transactions are conducted, describe the IRS and Justice Department efforts to deal with tax haven related transactions, and to identify interagency coordination problems.

This book was written at the request of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, The Assistant Attorney General (Tax Division), and the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury (Tax Policy).The purpose of this book was to develop an overview of tax havens and the use of tax havens by United States taxpayers. The study sought to determine the frequency and nature of tax haven transactions, identify specific types of tax haven transactions, obtain a description of the United States and foreign legal and regulatory environment in which tax haven transactions are conducted, describe Internal Revenue Service and Justice Department efforts to deal with tax haven related transactions, and to identify interagency coordination problems.The findings are based on a review of judicial decisions and published literature in the field of international tax planning, research into internal IRS documents concerning taxpayer activities, interviews with IRS personnel, personnel who deal with tax haven issues for other Federal government agencies, and lawyers and certified public accountants who specialize in international taxation. The findings are also based on a statistical analysis of available data concerning international banking, United States direct investment abroad, and foreign investment in the United States. While the findings did not uncover all the methods employed to use tax havens, the belief is that the inquiry was extensive enough to give an understanding of the situation and to enable the IRS to develop options which might be useful in improving the administration of the tax laws as they apply to tax havens

Testimony from the Director of the General Government Division of the General Accounting Office before the Subcommittee on Commerce, Consumer and Monetary Affairs of the Committee on Government Operations of the U.S. House of Representatives, primarily on the Internal Revenue Service's efforts to detect and deter tax law abuses relating to tax havens. The Federal Government is concerned about tax havens primarily because they afford significant opportunities to abuse the tax system, particularly through tax evasion. While the extent of illegal use of tax havens cannot be readily quantified, IRS estimates that tax evasion through the use of haven countries is costing the Treasury billions of dollars annually.

This book provides information on an issue of critical importance to tax administration in this country; the practice of sheltering U.S. earned income in foreign jurisdictions as a means of avoiding U.S. taxation. Each year, the United States loses an estimated $100 billion in tax revenues due to offshore tax abuses. Offshore tax havens today hold trillions of dollars in assets provided by citizens of other countries, including the United States. A related issue is the extent to which financial institutions in tax havens may be facilitating international tax evasion. About 50 tax havens operate in the world today with their twin hallmarks being secrecy and tax avoidance. Billions and billions of dollars worth of U.S. assets find their way into these secrecy tax havens, aided by banks, trust companies, accountants, lawyers, and from offshore tax abuses. This book discusses such sources of tax havens, as well as the steps that the IRS has taken to alleviate this problem.

From the Cayman Islands and the Isle of Man to the Principality of Liechtenstein and the state of Delaware, tax havens offer lower tax rates, less stringent regulations and enforcement, and promises of strict secrecy to individuals and corporations alike. In recent years government regulators, hoping to remedy economic crisis by diverting capital from hidden channels back into taxable view, have undertaken sustained and serious efforts to force tax havens into compliance. In Tax Havens, Ronen Palan, Richard Murphy, and Christian Chavagneux provide an up-to-date evaluation of the role and function of tax havens in the global financial system-their history, inner workings, impact, extent, and enforcement. They make clear that while, individually, tax havens may appear insignificant, together they have a major impact on the global economy. Holding up to $13 trillion of personal wealth-the equivalent of the annual U.S. Gross National Product-and serving as the legal home of two million corporate entities and half of all international lending banks, tax havens also skew the distribution of globalization's costs and benefits to the detriment of developing economies. The first comprehensive account of these entities, this book challenges much of the conventional wisdom about tax havens. The authors reveal that, rather than operating at the margins of the world economy, tax havens are integral to it. More than simple conduits for tax avoidance and evasion, tax havens actually belong to the broad world of finance, to the business of managing the monetary resources of individuals, organizations, and countries. They have become among the most powerful instruments of globalization, one of the principal causes of global financial instability, and one of the large political issues of our times.