Race to the bottom: Yellen makes case for global minimum tax rate

The US Treasury secretary says a global minimum corporate tax rate will ensure firms pay their fair share — but critics say it’s not that simple.

A global minimum corporate tax rate can help ensure everyone pays their fair share and will prevent companies from fleeing to countries with lower corporate tax rates, United States Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday. “Competitiveness is about more than how US-headquartered companies fare against other companies in global merger and acquisition bids,” Yellen told the Chicago Council on Global Affairs in her first official remarks as treasury secretary. Speaking ahead of this week’s virtual spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, Yellen touched more broadly on the US’s role in the post-pandemic global economic recovery.