DO CORPORATE TAXES HARM ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE? EXPLAINING DISTORTIONS IN R&D- AND EXPORT-INTENSIVE UK FIRMS

This paper analyzes the effects of corporate tax liability on firm-level total factor productivity (TFP) as the key driver of economic performance. This is a new dimension in the UK productivity puzzle that has not attracted attention so far. We use 6559 manufacturing firms over 2004-2011 to investigate whether higher levels of corporate tax affect the productivity catch-up process by reducing after-tax earnings that could alternatively be used for productivity-enhancing investment, particularly focusing on R&D- and export-intensive firms. Our key results are summarized as follows: first, higher levels of corporate taxation impact adversely on TFP and this finding is robust to different tax measures and insensitive to endogeneity bias; second, as R&D- and export-intensive firms tend to have relatively higher TFP growth, higher levels of tax liability as a share of earnings before interest and taxes decelerate TFP growth of these firms.