特朗普税改:两减一改、三大新税种和对美国经济的影响

Trump's Tax Reform Explained

2017年12月22日,经美国总统特朗普签署,美国《减税和就业法案》完成立法程序。中国学界对美国政府推行特朗普声称的美国"历史上最大规模减税"的决断印象深刻,并给予了积极评价。然而,我们对美国税改的认识还是粗浅和不准确的。本文的目的是提供一份关于美国税改的比较翔实和准确的介绍,并解释采纳相应税改措施的原由。本文主要讨论美国公司税的税改问题。美国公司税税改包括三个主要部分。第一部分是公司所得税由35%到21%的大幅下调。对此,中国经济学家十分关注,但遗憾的是,他们往往满足于把美国税改理解为公司所得税减税。第二部分是美国由全球征税制到属地征税制的转变。这种转变是美国税改的一个关键部分。第三部分是设立了一些新税种,以回应过渡到属地制所带来的新问题。在这些新税种中,最重要者有三:全球低税无形收入税、海外无形收入税和税基侵蚀税。本文对这些税种的征收、功能以及它们对美国经济的影响做了详细解释。在对美国新税制的作用和功能有了较好了解的基础上,本文作出的结论是:虽然税改对美国经济增长起到一定提振作用,但这种作用是有限的。首先,美国经济目前处于充分就业状态,减税导致的消费和投资的增加难以使经济增长速度的显著增加。其次,减税导致公共债务的增加,而公共债务的增加必将影响美国经济增速的增加。税改对美国国际收支平衡的影响具有很大不确定性。因此,美元未来既可能升值也可能贬值。虽然中国应该密切关注美国税改的短期和长期影响,但是也不应过于夸大其对美国经济和中国经济的影响。中国还是应该根据国内、外经济的大局进行宏观调控,根据自己的时间表推进改革(包括税制改革)的各项进程。

US President Donald Trump signed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act into a law on December 22 2017.Chinese academic circles are impressed by the US government’s determination in pushing through what the president called the largest tax cut in the history of the United States,and responded to the tax reform very positively.However,generally speaking,Chinese scholars’knowledge of the US tax reform is rather sketchy and imprecise.This article is aimed to depict a more detailed and accurate picture of the US tax reform and explain the underlying causes for the reform measures.Because the 70,000-page US tax code is extremely complicated,the article has to be focused on corporate tax reform,which contains three main elements.The first is a sweeping cut of corporate income tax from 35%to 21%,which is what Chinese economists are concerned most about.Unfortunately,many Chinese economists have taken the tax cuts as an equivalent to the US’tax reform.The second is the switching from a worldwide taxation system to a territorial one,which is a key component of the tax reform.The third is to create some new types of taxes,in response to the new situation under a territorial system.Among them are tax on global intangible low-taxed income(GILTI),tax on foreign-derived intangible income(FDII),and base erosion and anti-abuse tax(BEAT).The article explains in details how those taxes are collected and what are their functions as well as their impacts on the US economy.Based on a better understanding of the working and functions of the US’new taxation system,the article concludes that although the tax cuts will boost US’economic growth,its growth-boosting effect will be limited due to the fact that the US economy currently is growing at full capacity and the US’public debt will increase materially as a result of the tax cuts.The impact of the tax reform on US international balance of payments is not clear-cut,and hence the dollar can either rise or fall in the future.Although China should pay close attention to the impacts of the US’tax cuts both in the short and longer run,it should avoid over-exaggerating the impact of the tax reform on both the US economy and the Chinese economy.China should implement its macroeconomic policies in accordance with domestic and international situation and carry out institutional reforms,including reform of its tax system,based on its own agenda.