Property tax reform. The current system of council tax (a tax on residents of property) is absurd – it is based on 1991 values and uses a banding system which implies a very regressive relationship between property values and tax. There is a strong case for changing it to a proportional tax on property values. This has been recommended by both the Mirrlees Review (Adam et al. 2011) and Atkinson (2015). The rate could be set so as to produce more revenue than council tax does at the moment. This could be accompanied by a reduction in stamp duty on property sales (another absurd tax – at least at current levels – which amongst other things impedes mobility). A recent discussion of the issues is Adam et al. (2020).

VAT on a wider range of goods. Possibly it could be imposed on unhealthy foods, for instance. This would not be unproblematic, however, and the option of extending the coverage of VAT has been thoroughly considered by many governments.

NI payments on workers above the state pension age (currently 65, but will soon rise). These workers do not pay National Insurance contributions. Some commentators have advocated extending National Insurance contributions to all earnings regardless of the age of the worker. This might be worth doing, but there are a couple of points that should be noted. The first is that it is a basic principle of optimal taxation that taxes should be lower on factors in more elastic supply, and the work effort of such older workers almost certainly falls into this category. Secondly, NI contributions generate an entitlement to certain benefits, including retirement benefits. But workers over the statutory pension age might already be receiving their state pensions, so it is not clear what the additional NI contributions would entitle them to.

Reform to corporation tax. Corporation tax is a controversial tax. It might be argued that, as shown by Joseph Stiglitz many years ago (see Stiglitz 1976), it is non-distortionary as far as investment decisions financed by (tax-deductible) debt is concerned. However, this result does not apply for investment financed by equity. The Mirrlees Review (Adam et al. 2011) recommended changing this, by giving firms an equity allowance, and this proposal contains much of merit.