Open versus Closed Competence to Tax: A Comparative Legal Study of Municipal Taxes in Belgium and the Netherlands

This article describes and compares the possibilities under Belgian and Dutch law for taxation by local authorities. The most striking difference is that Belgian local authorities may decide on their own as to which taxes they wish to impose, save for interdictions imposed by law, whilst local authorities in the Netherlands can levy only those taxes allowed by national law. The main purpose of this study is to enquire if the differences in tax competence are as substantial as one might expect at first glance. More specifically, the authors compare the existence, meaning and scope of some gener... Mehr ...