Browse by: "2016"

Consumption Tax Trends provides information on Value Added Tax/Goods and Services Tax (VAT/GST) and excise duty rates in OECD member countries. It also contains information about indirect tax topics such as international aspects of VAT/GST developments and the efficiency of this tax. It also describes a range of taxation provisions such as the taxation of motor vehicles, tobacco and alcoholic beverages.

One case of transnational corruption out of five occurs in the extractive sector according to the 2014 OECD Foreign Bribery Report. In this area, corruption has become increasingly complex and sophisticated affecting each stage of the extractive value chain with potential huge revenue losses for the public coffers. This report is intended to help policy makers, law enforcement officials and stakeholders strengthen prevention efforts at both the public and private levels, through improved understanding and enhanced awareness of corruption risk and mechanisms. It will help better tailoring responses to evolving corruption patterns and effectively countering adaptive strategies. The report also offers options to put a cost on corruption to make it less attractive at both the public and private levels.

While refurbishments for the long-term operation of nuclear power plants and for the lifetime extension of such plants have been widely pursued in recent years, the number of plants to be decommissioned is nonetheless expected to increase in future, particularly in the United States and Europe. It is thus important to understand the costs of decommissioning so as to develop coherent and cost-effective strategies, realistic cost estimates based on decommissioning plans from the outset of operations and mechanisms to ensure that future decommissioning expenses can be adequately covered.
This study presents the results of an NEA review of the costs of decommissioning nuclear power plants and of overall funding practices adopted across NEA member countries. The study is based on the results of this NEA questionnaire, on actual decommissioning costs or estimates, and on plans for the establishment and management of decommissioning funds. Case studies are included to provide insight into decommissioning practices in a number of countries.

Why do financial markets see so little risk, while companies that invest in the real economy appear to be much more prudent? How will we fund future pensions when interest on the products that finance them are so low? Where will the trillions of dollars needed to improve and extend infrastructures come from? How should international capital flows be regulated? These and other challenges are discussed in this collection of expert opinions on the social, economic and policy perspectives facing international investors, governments, businesses, and citizens worldwide.

To capitalise on the new international resolve epitomised by COP21 and the agreement on the universal Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) requires a renewed effort to promote new policy thinking and new approaches to the great challenges ahead. Responding to new challenges means we have to adopt more ambitious frameworks, design more effective tools, and propose more precise policies that will take account of the complex and multidimensional nature of the challenges. The goal is to develop a better sense of how economies really work and to articulate strategies which reflect this understanding. The OECD’s New Approaches to Economic Challenges (NAEC) exercise challenges our assumptions and our understanding about the workings of the economy. This collection from OECD Insights summarises opinions from inside and outside the Organisation on how NAEC can contribute to achieving the SDGs, and describes how the OECD is placing its statistical, monitoring and analytical capacities at the service of the international community. The authors also consider the transformation of the world economy that will be needed and the long-term “tectonic shifts” that are affecting people, the planet, global productivity, and institutions.

The face of development has changed, with diverse stakeholders involved – and implicated – in what are more and more seen as global and interlinked concerns. At the same time, there is an urgent need to mobilise unprecedented resources to achieve the ambitious Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The private sector can be a powerful promotor of sustainable development. Companies provide jobs, infrastructure, innovation and social services, among others. Increasingly, investments in developing countries – even in the least developed countries – are seen as business opportunities, despite the risks involved. The public sector can leverage the private sector contribution, helping to manage risk and providing insights into effective policy and practice. Yet in order to set the right incentives, a better understanding is needed of the enabling factors, as well as the constraints, for businesses and investors interested in addressing sustainable development challenges.
The Development Co-operation Report 2016 explores the potential and challenges of investing in developing countries, in particular through social impact investment, blended finance and foreign direct investment. The report provides guidance on responsible business conduct and outlines the challenges in mobilising and measuring private finance to achieve the SDGs.  Throughout the report, practical examples illustrate how business is already promoting sustainable development and inclusive growth in developing countries. Part II of the report showcases the profiles and performance of development co-operation providers, and presents DAC statistics on official and private resource flows.  
 

Regulators are proactive referees of the sectors they regulate, contributing to the delivery of essential public utilities for citizens. To fulfill this function, they need to be constantly alert, checking sectoral trends as well as assessing the impact of their decisions. However, while measuring regulators’ performance is essential, it is also challenging, from defininig what should be measured to attributing impacts to regulators' decisions. To address these challenges, the OECD has developed an innovative framework that looks at the institutions, processes and practices that help regulators assess their performance. The framework has been applied to Latvia's Public Utilities Commission, which is responsible for regulating energy, communications, water and waste. The review offers unique insights into the work of a multi-sector regulator, identifying the organisational features that allow lessons and experiences to be shared across sectors and contribute to good performance. It  highlights the importance of clarifying the role and functions of the regulator and its relationship with other public institutions, setting long-term strategic objectives for the regulator's activities, and having the right regulatory tools with appropriate incentives for the efficient and effective provision of public utility services.
 

The annual Economic Outlook for Southeast Asia, China and India examines Asia’s regional economic growth, development and regional integration process. It focuses on the economic conditions of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member countries: Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Viet Nam. It also addresses relevant economic issues in People’s Republic of China and India to fully reflect economic developments in the region. The 2016 edition of the Economic Outlook for Southeast Asia, China and India comprises three main parts, each highlighting a particular dimension of recent economic developments in the region. The first part presents the regional economic monitor, depicting the medium-term economic outlook and macroeconomic challenges in the region. The second part consists of three chapters on “enhancing regional ties”, which is the special thematic focus of this edition. The third part includes structural policy country notes.

Going for Growth is the OECD’s regular report on structural reforms in policy areas that have been identified as priorities to boost incomes in OECD and selected non-OECD countries (Brazil, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Latvia, Russian Federation and South Africa). Policy priorities are updated every two years and presented in a full report, which includes individual country notes with detailed policy recommendations to address the priorities.The next full report will be published in 2017.
This interim report takes stock of the actions taken by governments over the past two years in the policy areas identified as priorities for growth. This stocktaking is supported by internationally comparable indicators that enable countries to assess their economic performance and structural policies in a wide range of areas.
 

How can Colombia improve both the quality and equity of its education system while also addressing efficiency challenges? Despite a fundamental transformation of its education system over the past two decades, Colombia faces two critical challenges: high levels of inequality from the earliest years and low levels of quality across its education system. This report assesses Colombia’s policies and practices against the best approaches in education and skills from across the OECD. It analyses its education system’s major strengths and the challenges it faces, from early childhood education and care to tertiary education. With insights drawn from international research, it offers recommendations on how Colombia can improve quality and equity to reach its goal of being the “most educated” country in Latin America by 2025. This report will be of interest in Colombia as well as other countries looking to raise the quality, equity and efficiency of their education systems.

How can Latvia improve the quality and equity of its education system and realise long-term efficiency gains? This report covers the whole education system from early childhood education and care to tertiary education and provides an assessment of Latvia’s policies and practices against the best approaches in education and skills across the OECD. This international comparison brings to the fore the many strengths of Latvia’s education system, but also highlights the challenges it faces and provides a number of recommendations in response. This report will be of value to Latvia but also policy makers in other countries looking to raise the quality, equity and efficiency of their education systems.

Thailand’s education system stands at a crossroads. Significant investment has widened access to education and the country performs relatively well in international assessments compared with its peers. But the benefits have not been universally distributed and Thailand has not received the return on its spending on education that it might have expected. This report encourages Thailand to focus on four priority areas to prepare students from all backgrounds for a fast-changing world. The first is to set clear, common standards for all students through a revised and improved curriculum. The second priority is to build capacity to reliably assess students across the full range of competencies needed for success in life and in learning. Third, Thailand needs to develop a holistic strategy to prepare teachers and school leaders to deliver education reform, including implementing the revised curriculum, and to tackle teaching shortages in the most deprived areas. The final challenge is to create a comprehensive information and communications technology strategy to equip all Thailand’s schools, teachers and students for the 21st century.

To tackle climate change, CO2 emissions need to be cut. Pricing carbon is one of the most effective and lowest-cost ways of inducing such cuts. This report presents the first full analysis of the use of carbon pricing on energy in 41 OECD and G20 economies, covering 80% of global energy use and of CO2 emissions. The analysis takes a comprehensive view of carbon prices, including specific taxes on energy use, carbon taxes and tradable emission permit prices. It shows the entire distribution of effective carbon rates by country and the composition of effective carbon rates by six economic sectors within each country. Carbon prices are seen to be often very low, but some countries price significant shares of their carbon emissions. The ‘carbon pricing gap’, a synthetic indicator showing the extent to which effective carbon rates fall short of pricing emissions at EUR 30 per tonne, the low-end estimate of the cost of carbon used in this study, sheds light on potential ways of strengthening carbon pricing.

With the rising economic importance of human resources and skills, employment and training agencies are often expected to play a more important role in local strategies to support new job creation, facilitate restructuring and increase productivity. The OECD Local Economic and Employment Development (LEED) Programme has developed a series of reviews on Local Job Creation to examine the contribution of local labour market policy to boosting quality employment and enhancing productivity. For Poland, the review has looked at the range of institutions and bodies involved in employment and skills policies, focusing on local strategies in the city of Poznań and the Radomski sub-region.

This report looks at a range of local employment and economic development issues in Saskatchewan and the Yukon, Canada, with a focus on indigenous peoples. The report provides a comparative framework to understand the role of the local level in contributing to more and better quality jobs, and practical recommendations to help federal, provincial/territorial, and local policy makers in Canada build effective and sustainable partnerships that join-up efforts across employment, training, and economic development policies. Co-ordinated policies can help workers find suitable jobs, while also stimulating entrepreneurship and productivity, which increases the quality of life and prosperity within a community as well as throughout the country.

Since the beginning of China’s economic transformation in the early 1970s, investment has been a key driver of China’s growth and has contributed to substantial improvements in living standards. Over three decades of average annual GDP growth of 10%, disposable incomes have soared, lifting hundreds of millions of people out of extreme poverty. The share of the population living in extreme poverty has declined from above 90% in the early 1980s to less than 10% today. However, this growth model is no longer sustainable. Returns on investment have declined, although they are still higher than those of the Asian Tigers. Excess capacity is plaguing several sectors, and negative externalities have been onerous, notably in terms of environmental degradation and income inequality. A key objective of the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020) is therefore to move the economy towards a path of more balanced, sustainable and inclusive growth.