從地方自治團體財政自主權探討地方稅

Exploring Local Tax Issues from Financial Rights of Local Self-Governing Organizations

地方財源不足而須高度仰賴中央政府的補助，一直是我國地方自治制度長久以來的問題。本文從地方財政的觀點討論地方稅的概念、課徵要件與限制。 首先，基於住民自治、自我負責的原理，產生地方自治制度，並進而發展出地方財政高權，以符合自治需求。然而在現行憲法的框架下，地方的財政立法權已被大量限縮，且財政收支劃分法將大半稅收給予中央，僅有少數稅收進入統籌分配款，由各地方政府共同分配。此外，各級地方政府彼此之間也存在分配不平等的問題。因此，本文建議中央須捨棄對地方稅捐立法權的過度限制、稅捐收入須由中央與地方合理共享，並將稅收分配規定入憲。
在地方稅的開徵上，本文認為所謂地方稅，指地方自治團體主要基於財政收入目的，在其行政區域內所課徵之無對價性的公法上金錢給付，且該給付收入由地方自治團體享有。課徵地方稅必須符合以下要件：一、地方稅須具備地域性；二、地方稅不得與國稅具有稅捐同類性；三、稅收歸地方自治團體享有。地方稅的類型主要集中在財產稅類、消費稅類及短期稅類，而較少所得稅類。在地方稅的限制上，地方稅法通則對課徵地方稅設有類型、年限、稅率之限制，立法者得隨時以修法方式增加限制條件，而不利於地方課徵地方稅。

The lack of local financial resources and the high dependence on subsidies from the central government have been long-standing problems in Taiwan’s local self-governance system. This paper discusses the concept of local taxation and its related requirements and restrictions in the Taiwanese context. The system of local self-governance has emerged based on the principle of local self-governance and self-responsibility and further developed into territorial, employee, organizational, financial, and legislative supremacy.
However, under the current constitutional framework, localities have been heavily deprived of their financial and legislative powers. Furthermore, due to the fiscal revenue and expenditure division method, most of the tax revenues is allocated to the central government, and only a small amount of tax revenues is allocated to municipalities, counties (cities), and townships (towns and cities). However, this allocation involves both vertical and horizontal inequality among the local governments because the municipalities receive the highest share, while the counties and towns only receive a small share. This uneven distribution in our country is even more obvious when it is compared to the ratio of tax revenue allocation between the federal government and the states of Germany. Therefore, this paper suggests that the central government abandon excessive restrictions on the legislative power of local taxation by the local governments and that tax revenues be reasonably shared between the central government and local governments.
When dealing with the issue of local taxation, the term local taxation must first be clearly defined. From the public-law perspective, a local tax is a non-reciprocal monetary benefit that a local self-governing body levies within its administrative area primarily for revenue purposes, and the local self-governing body enjoys the revenue from this monetary benefit. Local taxes must meet the following requirements: First, they must be territorial in nature; second, they must not be similar to the central government’s taxes in nature (to avoid duplication of taxation); and third, they must be levied by local self-governing bodies who will enjoy their benefits. The most common types of local taxes include property taxes, consumption taxes, and short-term taxes, but a few income tax-related taxes also exist. A comparison with the restrictions on local taxes imposed by the basic law of Germany at the constitutional level clearly depicts the many inadequacies in the protection of the interest (i.e., control over the fair share of local taxes) of the local government in our country.