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Equality and the Taxable Unit in Income Tax

Hemels, Sigrid LU orcid (2020) 14th GREIT Annual Conference Tax sustainability in an EU and international context. p.161-174
Abstract
For a long time, married women were treated differently from married men in personal income tax acts (PITA’s) around the world. The Netherlands was no exception to this rule. The PITA reflected the political, religious and legal situation, but at the same time was often behind on developments in those areas. The current Dutch semi-individual tax system in which single earner families pay more tax than double earner families is criticized by some Christian politicians and media. Furthermore, several academics suggested the introduction of a family taxation with a splitting system such as exists in Germany and - in a way- in the USA to reduce the tax burden of single income earners. In such system the spouse with low income in a dual income... (More)
For a long time, married women were treated differently from married men in personal income tax acts (PITA’s) around the world. The Netherlands was no exception to this rule. The PITA reflected the political, religious and legal situation, but at the same time was often behind on developments in those areas. The current Dutch semi-individual tax system in which single earner families pay more tax than double earner families is criticized by some Christian politicians and media. Furthermore, several academics suggested the introduction of a family taxation with a splitting system such as exists in Germany and - in a way- in the USA to reduce the tax burden of single income earners. In such system the spouse with low income in a dual income earner family would pay significantly more tax. As most Dutch women work part-time and earn less than their partner and taking into account price-elasticities, this compensation of single income earning families would be a disincentive for married women to work and gain economic independence. To put these proposals in perspective, this paper analyses the history of the tax treatment of married women and relates this to the Dutch political, religious and legal situation and places it in an international perspective. The chapter was written as a paper presented at the 14th Greit conference which was organised in June 2019 in Lund. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
organization
publishing date
type
Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Tax law, Equality, Gender discrimination, Personal income tax, married women
host publication
Tax Sustainability in an EU and International Context
editor
Brokelind, Cécile and Van Thiel, Servaas
pages
14 pages
publisher
IBFD
conference name
14th GREIT Annual Conference Tax sustainability in an EU and international context.
conference location
Lund, Sweden
conference dates
2019-06-19 - 2019-06-20
ISBN
978-90-8722-621-3
978-90-8722-622-0
978-90-8722-620-6
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
c9190711-a2b8-4f7b-9a42-9f868768a316
date added to LUP
2020-06-30 09:00:32
date last changed
2020-06-30 10:19:33
@inbook{c9190711-a2b8-4f7b-9a42-9f868768a316,
  abstract     = {{For a long time, married women were treated differently from married men in personal income tax acts (PITA’s) around the world. The Netherlands was no exception to this rule. The PITA reflected the political, religious and legal situation, but at the same time was often behind on developments in those areas. The current Dutch semi-individual tax system in which single earner families pay more tax than double earner families is criticized by some Christian politicians and media. Furthermore, several academics suggested the introduction of a family taxation with a splitting system such as exists in Germany and - in a way- in the USA to reduce the tax burden of single income earners. In such system the spouse with low income in a dual income earner family would pay significantly more tax. As most Dutch women work part-time and earn less than their partner and taking into account price-elasticities, this compensation of single income earning families would be a disincentive for married women to work and gain economic independence. To put these proposals in perspective, this paper analyses the history of the tax treatment of married women and relates this to the Dutch political, religious and legal situation and places it in an international perspective. The chapter was written as a paper presented at the 14th Greit conference which was organised in June 2019 in Lund.}},
  author       = {{Hemels, Sigrid}},
  booktitle    = {{Tax Sustainability in an EU and International Context}},
  editor       = {{Brokelind, Cécile and Van Thiel, Servaas}},
  isbn         = {{978-90-8722-621-3}},
  keywords     = {{Tax law; Equality; Gender discrimination; Personal income tax; married women}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{06}},
  pages        = {{161--174}},
  publisher    = {{IBFD}},
  title        = {{Equality and the Taxable Unit in Income Tax}},
  year         = {{2020}},
}