Tax law
A tax law is a legal norm that has been enacted by the legislature to regulate tax law. The entirety of all tax laws are the result of tax sovereignty and form the legal basis for the collection of taxes on the basis of Section X of the Basic Law .
Some tax laws mainly contain formal law (in Germany e.g. tax code and valuation law ); Formal law includes, in particular, general definitions and procedural rules. The other laws concern the individual types of tax and contain substantive law, namely regulations on questions about the taxable person , the taxable object , the tax base and the tariff .
Tax legislation is subject to frequent and often extensive changes, which are often ascribed the characteristics of tax reform or even tax simplification .
Interstate and international law
A special form of federal laws produced during the ratification of international treaties . An example of this are the double taxation agreements , which contain regulations on the extent to which the two contracting states are entitled to the respective taxation sovereignty.
The regulations of the European Community , such as B. the customs code for the Europe-wide standardization of customs regulations, which as supranational law have direct legal effect in the member states.
German tax laws
The German tax law is in federal laws , state laws and local ordinances regulated. A distinction must be made between this legislative sovereignty and thus the question of which regional authority is entitled to the tax revenue .
As a framework law, the Tax Code (AO) regulates which authorities are responsible for collecting taxes, who owes a tax or is liable for it, what rights and obligations the taxpayer and the tax authorities have, how one can defend oneself against decisions of the tax authorities how and under what conditions taxes can be collected and when tax offenses are present. The AO thus contains the most important provisions of tax procedural law .
The material tax law for the various types of tax is regulated in the individual tax laws (e.g. EStG , UStG etc.) with regard to tax liability or tax relief , assessment bases and tax rate .
However, it should be noted that the scope of the German tax laws in particular is almost unmanageable and the many individual provisions are only understandable to a few citizens. This fragmentation of tax legislation into a large number of individual tax and procedural laws , which particularly affects tax justice , is often criticized. The Cologne legal scholar Joachim Lang submitted the draft of a tax code on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Finance in 1993, which, analogous to the BGB, unites all tax laws. The proposal for an income tax code that the former constitutional judge Paul Kirchhof presented in 2001 also goes in this direction.
Federal laws
The German federal laws currently (as of January 1, 2020) include the following tax laws (table differentiated by law ):
Property tax is no longer levied and the Mineral Oil Tax Act was replaced on July 31, 2006 by the new Energy Tax Act. This list names other types of tax that are no longer levied .
State laws and municipal statutes
In addition to the federal laws is the communities - over the local tax laws of the countries granted the right by municipal - statutes own legal bases for expenditure taxes to create. Most municipalities have a dog tax and a drink tax statute . Often the cities also adopt an amusement tax statute and in many touristic places there is a second home tax statute .
Implementing regulations and guidelines
The tax laws also include the additional implementing regulations issued by the executive branch. In contrast, the guidelines or administrative regulations (e.g. income tax guidelines ) are not tax laws, but are intended to ensure that the law is administered uniformly and therefore only have a binding effect on the administration.
Austrian tax laws
The Austrian tax law knows essentially the following federal laws :
| law | formal / material | Tax type |
|---|---|---|
| Federal Tax Code | formally | - |
| Income Tax Act | material | Income tax , wage tax (Austria) , capital gains tax |
| Land Transfer Tax Act | material | Real estate transfer tax |
| Corporate Income Tax Act | material | Corporation tax |
| Motor Vehicle Tax Act | material | Vehicle tax |
| Mineral Oil Tax Act | material | Mineral oil tax |
| Sales Tax Act | material | Sales tax (value added tax) |
In addition to the current tax laws, there were also tax laws in Austria that have since been repealed. The applicability of the Inheritance and Gift Tax Act 1955 was suspended on July 31, 2008.
Individual evidence
- ^ Stefan Bajohr: Outline of state financial policy , p. 154
- ↑ Emanuel Vahid Towfi: Complexity and clarity of norms or laws are made for lawyers; mwN (PDF; 772 kB)
literature
- Stefan Bajohr: Outline of state financial policy . 2nd Edition. VS-Verlag, 2007, ISBN 978-3-531-15526-5 .
