EU Wants to Make Companies Say How Much Tax They Really Pay

The European Commission will propose later this year a rule requiring large multinational companies to publish the rate of corporate tax they actually pay, according to plans it announced Tuesday.

Countries in the European Union have headline corporate tax rates ranging from 9% to 30%, but few multinationals really pay those rates, as they legally reduce their bills through tax breaks designed to boost investment, or, more controversially, through profit shifting to achieve far lower effective tax rates.

The proposed effective tax rate disclosure rule would use methodologies currently being developed in the Organization for Economic Cooperation ...