文章基本信息

标题：Fixing Saskatchewan’s Potash Royalty Mess: A New Approach for Economic Efficiency and Simplicity
本地全文：下载
作者：Duanjie Chen ; Jack M. Mintz
期刊名称：The School of Public Policy Publications
印刷版ISSN：2560-8312
电子版ISSN：2560-8320
出版年度：2013
卷号：6
页码：1-19
DOI：10.11575/sppp.v6i0.42418
出版社：University of Calgary
摘要：For a government’s fiscal program to best serve the public interest, while also ensuring sufficient public revenue collection, it has to meet three criteria: efficiency, simplicity and fairness. Unfortunately, the royalty and tax system currently in place for Saskatchewan’s robust potash-mining industry is none of these three things; it has actually reached the point of incoherence and absurdity, or a mess. Under the current royalty and tax regime for potash producers, the tangled thicket of royalties, taxes and credits can differ between commencement dates for production, projects of different sizes, or even projects of similar size but with different profitability; it also has potash producers generally enjoying a much lighter tax burden on marginal investments than that borne by the oil and gas industry and most other non-resource industries. The result is distortions and inefficiencies, resulting in subpar investment activity, which can only stand in the way of Saskatchewan reaching its full economic potential. That needs to change. The Saskatchewan government can implement a simpler and properly structured rent-based tax and a revenue-based royalty as minimum payment (where the royalty can be credited against the rent tax), each with a single rate and an identical tax base for all tax and royalty payers. Such a properly structured royalty and tax system can deliver improved productivity, without reducing investment incentives, resulting in a better partnership for both Saskatchewan’s industry and government in the long run.
其他摘要：For a government’s fiscal program to best serve the public interest, while also ensuring sufficient public revenue collection, it has to meet three criteria: efficiency, simplicity and fairness. Unfortunately, the royalty and tax system currently in place for Saskatchewan’s robust potash-mining industry is none of these three things; it has actually reached the point of incoherence and absurdity, or a mess. Under the current royalty and tax regime for potash producers, the tangled thicket of royalties, taxes and credits can differ between commencement dates for production, projects of different sizes, or even projects of similar size but with different profitability; it also has potash producers generally enjoying a much lighter tax burden on marginal investments than that borne by the oil and gas industry and most other non-resource industries. The result is distortions and inefficiencies, resulting in subpar investment activity, which can only stand in the way of Saskatchewan reaching its full economic potential.That needs to change. The Saskatchewan government can implement a simpler and properly structured rent-based tax and a revenue-based royalty as minimum payment (where the royalty can be credited against the rent tax), each with a single rate and an identical tax base for all tax and royalty payers. Such a properly structured royalty and tax system can deliver improved productivity, without reducing investment incentives, resulting in a better partnership for both Saskatchewan’s industry and government in the long run.