On the eve of his first overseas trip as U.S. president, Joe Biden is pushing for a dramatic revamping of international corporate tax policies that could resolve a stalemate between the United States and Europe over taxing America’s Big Tech sector and make it much harder for all major multinational corporations to exploit tax havens.
Meeting in London on Friday, the G-7 finance ministers are expected to endorse a proposal by Biden and U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen for a minimum global corporate tax of at least 15 percent, part of a measure that major governments hope will yield corporate taxes that are not getting paid worldwide. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which is responsible for writing tax guidelines in the world’s wealthiest nations, is leading the discussions. This week, the new OECD secretary-general, Mathias Cormann, called Biden’s plan a “game-changer” and said he was “quietly optimistic” about reaching an international deal on taxing multinational companies.
