On Feb. 6 and 7, 2023, the WU Institute of Austrian and International Tax Law Vienna held its first Tax Law Technology Conference. Dr. Markus Brem (Director of GTP) attended the sessions.
The topics addressed by the panel speakers were on (1) tax compliance and digitalization, (2) tax compliance supported by ERP systems, (3) VAT, transaction taxes, (4) transfer pricing, (5) DTL and blockchain technologies, and (6) digital tax audit & tax disputes. About 60 participants represented an international audience of tax practicitioners and academians.
The recurrent theme through the sessions was the digitalization and the corresponding opportunities for tax practitioners to foster new approaches of coping with tax challenges such as data management, data processing, tax filing, tax compliance, and tax audits. Interestingly, throughout the two-days conference no indication was found that there is one unique single-point solution which fits all but the definition of the objective may result in the appropriate approach of resolving the challenge of digitalization. but the definition of the objective may result in the appropriate approach of resolving the challenge of digitalization. However, what become clear for most, if not all, of the participants is that the rapid change of technologies will unevitably request tax departments and tax authorities to reconsider long-standing approaches of the past decades. For example, blockchain technologies is likely to result in new modes of governance and organization between actors like firms, authorities, jurisdictions, and individuals.
As a participant, I congratulate the orgnaizers of the conference. In case of the forthcoming second edition of this tax technology conference, it is recommened to address the issues of small and medium-sized taxpayers and, by doing so, to invite experts who serve such clients and bring this niche expertise into the conference room. In general, visiting international conference on international taxation, it has been observerved throughout many years that individual taxpayers and small-business units are not really in the focus of these expert platforms. Among many reasons, one might have to do with the size of the fee volume of such client cases. Large client cases may set higher incentives for present such expertise towards an international public audience.