Small business taxation

AUTHORS: Claire Crawford ; Judith Freedman

This chapter considers how small, owner-managed businesses are currently taxed and how this might be improved. Our focus is on the difficulties created by taxing different legal forms of business in different ways. Differences in tax treatment across a spectrum from employees to the self-employed (unincorporated firms) and on to companies (incorporated firms) create opportunities for taxpayers to reduce their tax liability and their social security contributions (NICs) by converting income from labour into income from capital.

Related papers and presentations

PLEASE NOTE: presentations from the September meeting represent draft work in progress. Factual accuracy is not guaranteed, and opinions may not be the fully-formed views of authors. They are posted here to stimulate discussion, and should not be quoted or cited without the authors' permission.

Reforming the business tax system: does size matter? Fundamental issues in small business taxation
Judith Freedman
This paper looks at how to design a tax system for small businesses and was given as part of a debate on the Australian tax system.
02 Oct 2009 , Book Chapters

Small business tax: where do we go from here?
Judith Freedman
Small businesses give rise to big tax issues.
01 Jun 2008 , Newspaper Articles

Small Business Taxation
Claire Crawford and Judith Freedman
This paper forms part of a special study for the Mirrlees Review and was presented at the IFS Residential Conference 2007.
20 Apr 2007 , Conference Papers

Small business taxation
Claire Crawford and Judith Freedman
This presentation was delivered at the IFS Residential Conference 2007.
20 Apr 2007 , Presentations

Small business taxation: the indefinable pursuit of the unachievable?
Judith Freedman
This paper was given as the ICAEW Hardman Memorial Lecture 2006.
16 Nov 2006 , Presentations

Small businesses - preliminary issues and questions
Judith Freedman
26 Oct 2006 , Presentations

The Review is funded by the Nuffield Foundation and the ESRC.