Offshore, mobility and taxation
Join us for our Offshore, mobility, and taxation conference, an international conference showcasing the most recent research from academia and NGOs addressing the challenges of taxation and offshore wealth, and what can be done to solve the problems.
Governments need revenue to function but increasingly face challenges when raising it through taxation. Wealthy individuals have become difficult to tax effectively as they manipulate their legal residence into offshore locations, effectively “ghosting” the places from which they benefit. Multinational corporations routinely book profits in tax-favourable formats and locations, ghosting the systems that enable their profitability. Ghosting is a global phenomenon that affects all states, but its outsized impact on developing countries renders it a systemic threat to global economic stability. How does such ghosting work? What are its impacts? Where do the problems lie? What might be done? This one-day conference will bring together academics, policymakers, and NGOs to discuss new trends in offshore, mobility, taxation and solutions to seemingly intractable problems.
The full programme will be available here soon.
The conference is funded by the ESRC Grant "Taxing Ghosts".
Conference programme
Session one | Multinational corporations and Tax
Hidden Related‑Party Transactions and the Impact of Beneficial Ownership Transparency on Profit Shifting
Miroslav Palanský — Tax Justice Network / Charles University, Prague
Obscuring Ownership: How Contractual Arbitrage Reconfigures Control in a Transparent World
Ronen Palan — City University of London
Co‑author: Richard Phillips — Director, Iconomist / Cityperc, City University of London
The Amfree Case and the Selective Claiming of Corporate Nexus
Allison Christians — McGill University
Session two | Beneficial ownership registries and individual wealth
Asset Beneficial Ownership – Enforcing Wealth Tax and Other Positive Spillover Effects
Andres Knobel — Tax Justice Network
Presented by: Miroslav Palanský — Tax Justice Network / Charles University, Prague
Death and Taxes: Inheritance Tax Planning and Unexpected Mortality
Jeanne Bomare — LSE
Co‑authors: Yonatan Berman — King’s College London, Ignacio Orueta — LSE
Leveraging Information about Ownership Networks to Improve Taxation and Bridging the Gap for Effective Asset Transparency
Maria Jofre (Data Analysis and Insights Lead) — Open Ownership
Tymon Kiepe (Head of Policy and Research) — Open Ownership
Presented by: Alanna Markle — Open Ownership
Session three | Globalised assets
What Does the Global FDI Network Actually Look Like? Opening the Black Box of Offshore Investment
Daniel Haberly — Centre for the Study of Corruption / University of Sussex
Charlie Lawrie — Centre for the Study of Corruption / University of Sussex
Gateways, Funnels, and Stackers: How People Hide UK Property Ownership through Offshore Structures
Kristin Surak — LSE
Johnathan Inkley — University of Cambridge
The Politics of Wealth and Intangible Assets: Lessons from a Failed Conglomerate of South Africa
Corentin Cohen — University of Oxford
From Residence to Source: Rethinking the Allocation of Corporate Income in a Globalised Economy
Afton Titus — University of Cape Town
Session four | Individuals, wealth, and tax
Global Offshore Wealth, 2001–2023
Sarah Godar — EU Tax Observatory / DIW Berlin
Co‑authors: Souleymane Faye — EU Tax Observatory, Carolina Moura — EU Tax Observatory, and Gabriel Zucman — Paris School of Economics
How They Do It: A Taxonomy of Billionaire Tax Minimisation Techniques
Marlies Glasius — University of Amsterdam / Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
Naturalizing Privileges in the Offshore World: Moralizing Golden Passports in Malta
Lucas Puygrenier — Université libre de Bruxelles / MIGRAFISC Project
LSE holds a wide range of events, covering many of the most controversial issues of the day, and speakers at our events may express views that cause offence. The views expressed by speakers at LSE events do not reflect the position or views of the London School of Economics and Political Science.