On The Expansion Of EU State Aid Rules In Tax Law

This article is a study on the EU state aid system,which sorts out and summarizes the background,substances,and procedures of the EU state aid system,and its tendency to expand in recent years.The study aims to summarize the EU's attitude to state aid and preferential tax policies through the recent practice of the EU state aid system,and to provide some useful lessons for China's state aid practice and other international economic and trade activities.Focusing on the EU state aid system,this article collects a lot of first-hand literature,especially the regulations,notices,cases,guidelines,news provided on the EU official website,so as to study the framework and practice of the EU state aid system.Based on the European Commission cases of state aid investigations on tax incentives of member states since 2013,the adoption of the state aid system by the EU will further limit the tax sovereignty of member states.However,European Commission's decisions will still be hindered by EU court judgments.By comparing the EU state aid system with other similar systems and concluding articles of scholars and public speech delivered by officials,this article summarizes and concludes that the EU's application of the EU's state aid system has surpassed the legislative intent of state aid system.By reviewing China's state aid system and practice,combined with the aforementioned research,it is suggested that China should learn from the EU state aid system to strengthen the construction of the legal system of state aid,to coordinate the conflict between the state aid system and industrial policies,and to keep a watchful eye on the expansion of the EU's application of the state aid system in international taxation.This article concludes that a series of state aid surveys conducted by the European Commission in the field of taxation in recent years are aimed at protecting competition in the European Common Market from distortion.The essence is to expand the state aid system from tax legislation to tax enforcement,so as to constrain the tax sovereignty of member states to achieve their EU-wide tax coordination and crack down on tax avoidance of multinational corporations.However,this series of actions has been challenged and attacked by member states,multinational companies and other countries simultaneously.The main point is that EU's application of the state aid system exceeds the purpose of the system,and it also challenges the existing international tax rules,leading to the uncertainty of EU's tax policy.At the same time,the European Commission's decision on the Belgian “excess profits” tax ruling and the Netherlands' decision to grant selective tax benefits to Starbucks have also been revoked by General Court of the European Union.It is yet to be determined whether the purpose of the European Commission's action.In view of the foregoing conclusions,this article gives the following suggestions: The concept of EU state aid is similar to the WTO subsidies and China's industrial policies,but they are also different in some ways,which should not be neglected.However,China's current system of state aid is still young,and many difficulties will arise in its application.China should learn from the EU's aid system,strengthen the legal system for state aid as a competition policy,and coordinate the conflict between the state's aid system and industrial policies.China should learn from the EU's recent series of state aid surveys to improve internal state aid system,and also pay attention to the relationship between state aid and tax rules in international trade disputes,so as to be prepared to respond to allegations by the EU and other countries on state aid or subsidies.China should also participate more in the development of international tax rules,promote international tax cooperation,and combat tax avoidance of multinational enterprises.