Part 1 - AL-Tax

International Taxation HandbookFiscal burden(1 is best; 5 is worst)543210Hong KongSingaporeTurkeyTaiwanKoreaMalaysiaThailandJapanAustraliaChinaIndiaIndonesia8 14 565858 58 66 83 101 101 101 127Rank (out of 161)Figure 11.3Ranking of fiscal burdenTable 11.10Asian economies’ fiscal burden, ranked by relativepositionQuarter Number of Asian economies %1 2 16.72 5 41.73 4 33.34 1 8.3Total 12 100.0Table 11.10 summarizes the relative fiscal burden rankings of the Asianeconomies. Two, or 16.7%, were in the top quarter, followed by five countries, or41.7%, in the second quarter. In other words, 58.4% of the Asian economies in thepresent study ranked in the top half.This finding is somewhat different from that found when the Tax Misery Indexis used to make comparisons. In that index, a higher percentage of Asian economieswere above average in terms of happiness.Another difference that can be seen by making a comparison of the various rankingof each country is that some countries did better or worse using the Index ofEconomic Freedom data. This difference can be explained by the differences in thecomponents of the two indexes. The Tax Misery Index included the employer andemployee payments for social security, the value added tax, and the wealth tax,which the Economic Freedom Index did not. The Economic Freedom Index includedgovernment spending, which the Tax Misery Index did not.284