The European Union: Eastern enlargement and taxation

The European Union has not defined its limits in geographical terms. Each enlargement has led and will lead to a decrease of the European Union's per capita GDP. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the transition countries went through a long and deep recession. However, they have reached a stage of positive growth and their tax levels are approaching the lower limit of the range of tax/GDP ratios in European Union countries. Differences exist in tax capacity and tax effort. In some countries, greater efforts are possible to improve tax revenues. Further examination of the timing of tax administration reform may shed light on tax effort in transition countries. The paper also suggests the existence of a negative relationship between tax effort and corruption. (JEL P27, H20) This research is supported in part by San Jose State University (SJSU) during the author's stay at SJSU as 2003-04 International Tax Policy Research Fellow. An earlier version of this paper was presented at a seminar at SJSU. The author gratefully acknowledges useful comments received from seminar participants.