[kamaal]

Only because India's tax base isn't as elaborate as the US tax base currently. Gradually this will change, countries like India are growing and the government needs a lot of tax to build infrastructure and other stuff.

I think in the next few decades Indian tax system would equally if not more complicated than the US tax system.

[ska]

I fail to see why complexity is a necessary result of increasing tax revenues. Most of the complexity seems to come from policy initiatives and successful lobbying of special interest groups .. both of which may be considered to be misguided.

[kamaal]

>>I fail to see why complexity is a necessary result of increasing tax revenues.

Because increasing tax base also means increasing the sources which you can tax. In case of India, nearly all business men don't pay taxes. There is a lot of money exchanged through corruption at all levels, there is money exchanged through gifts, dowry etc etc.

Which is why the biggest reforms pending in India currently is to get everyone to have a bank account, so that they can be paid through a bank instead of handing out cash directly. Once the necessary infrastructure is in place(Bank accounts, connectivity etc), you can start reducing the supply of paper money and have people deal in electronic means. You can increase your tax base and cut a great deal of unaccounted transactions and tax them appropriately. You can also cut corruption since a transaction implies a source and receiver, who need to explain what they are doing when a transaction of money is taking place.

[ska]

That doesn't mean you have to have much added complexity. The complexity doesn't really come from adding sources, it comes from adding exemptions and credits.

e.g. an overly simplistic tax code could read: everyone pays 18% on all income. All money you get from any source is income.

Now clearly that has some problems - but complexity isn't one of them.

Reporting and fraud are separate issues, or at least separable ones.