Forget the Old Consensus, Tax Havens Serve a Good Purpose

Generally analyzed through the lens of tax collection, a country's creation of a tax haven within its borders is universally deemed lousy policy.

Domestic firms use them to shift profits to affiliates where a lower rate applies and thus reduce their company-wide effective corporate tax rate, with the new job and investment gains concentrated in the lower-rate jurisdiction generally not enough to make up for the loss in revenue from profit-shifting.