By Theo Vermaelen, Professor of Finance and The
Schroders Chaired Professor of International Finance and Asset
Management at INSEAD
The recent attack on the tax policies of corporations becomes
close to ridiculous when politicians argue that companies that try
to avoid taxes (legally) are "socially irresponsible" and
"immoral."
The people interviewed in the recent INSEAD Knowledge piece How
Should Multinationals Be Taxed are disproportionally
representatives of the political left: two socialist politicians
(Fleur Pellerin from France and Dirk van der Maelen from Belgium)
and representatives of left-wing organisations (War on Want, Tax
Justice Network). As usual, the Left talks about taxation in terms
of "fairness" and "justice" rather than
economic efficiency. In other words, it's always about dividing
the pie more equally assuming that the size of the pie is
unaffected. Fairness and justice are very subjective concepts. The
French Left believes that taxing people
