The US has become one of the lowest-taxed countries in the world. Here are the 6 other nations with the smallest tax burdens.
- The US tax burden slid to among the lowest for major global economies in 2018. It now sits above just Ireland, Chile, and Mexico, according to a report from an intergovernmental organization released Thursday.
- It fell to 24.3% of gross domestic product, the result of President Trump's 2017 tax cuts that slashed corporate rates.
- Data from the OECD showed US tax burdens has steadily shrunk since 2000 when the tax-to-GDP ratio stood at 28.3% in the last year of Bill Clinton's presidency.
- "There's been an enormous long-term reduction in corporate taxes," tax expert William Gale told Business Insider, referring to a smaller share of corporate taxes relative to GDP.
- Here are the six countries with the lowest tax burdens, other than the US.
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The US tax burden slid to among the lowest for major global economies in 2018, sitting above only Ireland, Chile, and Mexico, according to a report from an intergovernmental organization released Thursday.
It fell to 24.3% of gross domestic product, the result of President Trump's 2017 tax cuts that slashed corporate rates.
The American rate slid lower from 26.8% in 2017, according to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, a Paris-based organization with 36 member countries. The average across all countries was 34.3% last year.
It's a stark contrast to the social democracies of Europe, which tend to have robust welfare systems in place that provide benefits like retirement pensions, free healthcare, and ample vacation time to its citizens, NPR reported. France and Belgium lead the pack with a 46.1% and 44.9% tax-to-GDP ratio in 2018, respectively.
Data from the OECD showed US tax burdens has steadily shrunk since 2000 when the tax-to-GDP ratio stood at 28.3% in the last year of Bill Clinton's presidency.
William Gale, the co-director of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, told Business Insider there's a "free-market spirit" among many American lawmakers who have sought to roll back the size of government in recent decades.
"There's been an enormous long-term reduction in corporate taxes," Gale said, referring to smaller share of corporate taxes relative to GDP.
US government policy has tilted towards cutting taxes without lowering spending so far this century, which resulted in a deficit nearing $1 trillion in the 2018 fiscal year.
Here are six other countries that have similarly low tax burdens, ranked in increasing order: