A guerra fiscal do ICMSquem ganha e quem perde

Resumo

Brazilian states have been competing among themselves to harbor industrial plants by granting incentives related to the state value added tax — the ICMS — which, though forbidden by law, show an intensity incompatible with states current financial conditions. This article proposes a set of conditions that should be met to justify the provision of incentives and shows that, from a national perspective, they are seldom met. However, from the point of view of a particular state government, the same conditions are satisfied in most cases, justifying its engagement in the fiscal war, which dynamics is quite perverse: public finances — and, as a consequence, local production conditions — deteriorate in all states and fiscal incentives, due to generalization, loose their power to attract investment. The ultimate winners of the fiscal war are the financially stronger states, which are able to support the revenue loss and yet provide reasonable production conditions. It’s argued that divergence between national and state objectives and between the best state development strategy in the short and in the long runs could be smoothed out by changing the border tax adjustments adopted for treatment of interstate trade flows. If the destination principle were implemented, incentives to participate in the fiscal war would be practically eliminated.

Ficha do documento

Tipo

Estudo

Ano

1997

Instituição

Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada (Ipea)

Fonte

Repositório do Ipea

Idioma

Português

Acesso

Acesso aberto

Identificador

oai:repositorio.ipea.gov.br:11058/2253

Licença

Licença Padrão Ipea

Abrangência

Brasil

Temas

Finanças Públicas

Palavras-chave

Guerra fiscalIncentivos financeiro-fiscaisTributação das transações interestaduaisImposto sobre Circulação de Mercadorias e Serviços (ICMS)