The CIAT Executive Secretariat headquarters in Panama City was the venue for the First Meeting of the Working Group on Estimation of the Effective Tax Burden on Investment held on July 4 through 6, and whose main objective is to develop a comparative study on the subject, which constitutes an initial pioneer effort for the Latin American countries.

The participants in the meeting were Marvin Cardoza from the General Directorate of Internal Taxes of the Dominican Republic, Rafael Fernández and Mario Pires from the National Customs and Tax Administration Integrated Service (SENIAT) of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Mauro Andino and Ximena Amoroso from the Internal Revenue Service (SRI) of Ecuador, César Silvero and Ricardo Benitez from the State Undersecretariat of Taxation (SET) of Paraguay and Irene Carrizo from the General Directorate of Revenues (DGI) of Panama, as well as the expert Economist, Ricardo Fenochietto, from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The Executive Secretariat was represented by the Director of Studies and Training, María Raquel Ayala, the Tax Studies and Research Manager, Miguel Pecho and the Technical Assistant, Gaspar Maldonado. Through a videotaped statement, the CIAT Executive Secretary, Márcio Verdi, welcomed the participants.

The group reviewed the main methodologies existing for calculating effective tax burdens, in particular those measuring the marginal effective tax rate (METR) and the average effective tax rate (AETR) based on taxpayer returns or files as well as through National Accounts. The working group’s computerized platform was also created, for the purpose of registering all the discussions of the members as well as storing the pertinent bibliography on the subject matter under analysis.

The second face-to-face meeting of the working group has been scheduled for November 2011.

Pictured are members of the First Meeting of Working Group on the Estimation of Effective Tax Burden on Investment.
The meeting was held in the CIAT yield from 4 to July 6, 2011.