| Abstract [eng] |
The main purpose of the paper is to analyze the concept of tax avoidance and to identify its place in the legal system. The paper starts with a description of a tax as an obligation set to a society to help a state to implement its essential functions. The main part of the paper analyses tax avoidance as a legal, economic and social phenomenon. Tax avoidance is started to be examined from its definition and features. Further, it discloses the concept position of the tax avoidance in the legal system of Lithuania: at first it presents the conception of tax avoidance in Lithuanian legal system and then it analyses the case law of the Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania. After that, for a thorough dissection of the concept of tax avoidance, the paper reveals the relevant practice of the Commission on Tax Disputes under the Government of the Republic of Lithuania. The paper also analyses tax avoidance and principal aspects related to case law of the European Court of Justice, because the practice is recognized as a direct source of law. Moreover, the paper based on methods to find out the reasons of tax avoidance both generally and in Lithuania and further on it researches differences and relations between tax avoidance, tax evasion and tax planning. Getting to the end, the paper describes the general and special rules of law, which interdict tax avoidance and their position in Lithuanian legal system. Finally, the paper ends in suggestions for the State Tax Inspectorate and the legislator. |
