Buoyancy and Elasticity: Determinants of
BUOYANCY AND ELASTICITY: DETERMINANTS OF
LOCAL TAX SYSTEM 'S PERFORMANCE
By: Julhusin B. Jalisan
Civil servants and priests, soldiers and ballet-dancers, schoolmasters and police constables, Greek museums and Gothic steeples, civil list and services listthe common seed within which all these fabulous beings slumber in embryo is taxation.
Karl Marx
Every citizen, whether young or old, wealthy or poor, property owners or property-less, pays taxes to help finance governmental functions. Every business pays taxes, which almost certainly enter into the prices the consumers pay. The wages of the workers are withheld for income taxes. No one can avoid paying taxes.
Taxes have always been the traditional sources of government revenues. Recourse to taxation to finance the operational costs of government has been availed of by rulers of all times and climes from antiquity down to the present. It is what the government uses for community development.
Taken in this light, therefore, taxes are not mere contributions of the people to their governments, but represent the peoples ' investments for their own welfare and future. Despite this, however, and the compulsory nature of taxes, many delinquent taxpayers manage to evade or avoid the payment of their taxes in one way or another. Tax evasion has become a serious societal problem. Too many people fail to pay their rightful tax. As a consequence, the government incurs huge deficit, and its delivery of basic services is tremendously affected.
With R.A. 7160, otherwise known as the Local Government Code of 1991, providing greater degree of fiscal autonomy to local government units, a periodic evaluation of the performance of the prevailing local tax system from the perspective of resource mobilization is, therefore, an imperative task among local government units.
Estimation of Tax Buoyancy and Elasticity An important point to consider in any tax system is the responsiveness of the tax revenue to
LOCAL TAX SYSTEM 'S PERFORMANCE
By: Julhusin B. Jalisan
Civil servants and priests, soldiers and ballet-dancers, schoolmasters and police constables, Greek museums and Gothic steeples, civil list and services listthe common seed within which all these fabulous beings slumber in embryo is taxation.
Karl Marx
Every citizen, whether young or old, wealthy or poor, property owners or property-less, pays taxes to help finance governmental functions. Every business pays taxes, which almost certainly enter into the prices the consumers pay. The wages of the workers are withheld for income taxes. No one can avoid paying taxes.
Taxes have always been the traditional sources of government revenues. Recourse to taxation to finance the operational costs of government has been availed of by rulers of all times and climes from antiquity down to the present. It is what the government uses for community development.
Taken in this light, therefore, taxes are not mere contributions of the people to their governments, but represent the peoples ' investments for their own welfare and future. Despite this, however, and the compulsory nature of taxes, many delinquent taxpayers manage to evade or avoid the payment of their taxes in one way or another. Tax evasion has become a serious societal problem. Too many people fail to pay their rightful tax. As a consequence, the government incurs huge deficit, and its delivery of basic services is tremendously affected.
With R.A. 7160, otherwise known as the Local Government Code of 1991, providing greater degree of fiscal autonomy to local government units, a periodic evaluation of the performance of the prevailing local tax system from the perspective of resource mobilization is, therefore, an imperative task among local government units.
Estimation of Tax Buoyancy and Elasticity An important point to consider in any tax system is the responsiveness of the tax revenue to
Cited: Manasan, Rosario G. "Survey and Review of Forecasting Models in Internal Government Revenues," Philippine Institute for Development Studies, No. 81-13, March 1981. Mansfield. "Elasticity and Buoyancy of a Tax System: A Method Applied to Paraguay", IMF Staff Papers, Vol. 19, No. 2, 1972. Osoro and Leuthold. "Changing Tax Elasticities Over Time: The Case of Tanzania", African Development Review, Vol. 6, No.1, June 1994. Trinidad, Emmanuel and Perio Sylvia de, "Buoyancy and Elasticity of Revenue," Journal of Philippine Development, Vol. VIII, Nos. 1 and 2, 1981. http.//www.students.uiuc.edu/~majuca/buoyancy.html http.//www.students.uiuc.edu/~majuca/growth.html