Research profile: Kim Brooks

Kim Brooks’ fundamental research concern is supporting countries in the development of defensible, robust tax law frameworks. Her research might be divided into three clusters: identifying and assessing the policy decisions that underpin income tax frameworks in countries around the world, exploring the consequences of tax law design for international distributive justice, and evaluating specific provisions in domestic (e.g. Canadian) income tax law.

Almost every country around the world has introduced an income tax law. Understanding the common elements of and variations among those laws is a doctrinal component of Brooks’ research. This work helps countries adopt progressive tax changes (borrowing from the experiences of others) and helps clarify our thinking about tax design and tax policy options.

A second cluster of Brooks’ works is concerned with international distributive justice. Although income tax law is contained in domestic legislation, labour and capital are highly mobile. A complex web of domestic law and tax treaties intersect to allocate taxing rights (and collection options) between countries. The allocation of these rights has profound consequences for countries’ (especially middle- and low-income countries) abilities to raise badly needed revenue. Brooks’ research presses for attention to the international distributive consequences of this expanding international tax framework.

Finally, Brooks is curious about the sensibility of provisions within Canada’s tax laws. She regularly identifies an area of tax law (for example, the taxation of fringe benefits or corporate reorganizations) and uses that area as an opportunity to apply evaluative criteria to assess whether policy reforms are needed.