Public Finance - Tax System Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Public Finance - Tax System - Essay Example While a tax is imposed it somehow hampers the free market operation and hence tax is subject to some social cost. Thats why an efficient taxation should minimize the social cost or welfare loss. On the other hand it should target to encourage the saving and investment in the society. According to Adam Smith, the tax structure should be fair and clear enough i.e. everyone should have the information regarding the tax that is paid and the administration of the tax system should be clear and easy. While a tax is introduced the following facts should be kept into mind. 1. The tax system should be economically efficient i.e. the benefit of taxation should exceed the social cost of it. The benefit includes the correcting effect, allocation of resources and insurance of equality. 2. The tax system should possess administrative efficiency. It should be easy to monitor and maintain and the system should be simple enough so that the administrative cost and the compliance cost are minimum. 4. There should be close coordination between the political decision makers and the tax system. It implies that tax payers should have the perfect knowledge about the mode of operation of the taxation system and the political decision makers should be well aware of the preference of the people so that the change in decision must be the resemblance of the choice of the majority of the tax payers which is a basic feature of a democratic system. All the aforesaid features are closely related to a fair distribution and the economic benefit of the taxes. Beneficial tax normally refers to the optimal taxation. The optimal tax theory is based on the equality and the economy of collection of taxation. While any government frames a taxation policy it should keep into mind that the taxation should be socially justified and have minimum impacts on the economic decisions. A wide