Tax discrimination in EU Law and the OECD model tax convention

The use of taxes by states as a tool to protect their nationals and domestic products constitutes a problem, tax discrimination, to be avoided in the international arena. Tax discrimination creates a heavy tax burden on foreign goods, services and persons as an obstacle to international trade. Increased mobility as a result of globalization caused high pressure about the elimination of barriers to trade and the fight against discrimination. With this pressure, the principle of non-discrimination is introduced by international organizations, economic integrations and treaties. The last two constitute the main levels of non-discrimination rules. For the treaties level, model tax treaties such as the OECD and the UN Models are important. For the second level, regulations of economic integrations such as EU or NAFTA are instances. To reach a more comprehensive, effective and fair rule globally, these different levels should be compared. For this study, EU law and the OECD Model are chosen due to their wide practices and spheres of influence. With evaluating their existing interactions and differences, the possible interactions have been discussed and many suggestions have been made such as the utilization of the CJEU's case law in the OECD Model, adding concepts such as indirect or reverse discrimination to the OECD Model, transferring practices like eliminating the objective justifications to EU law. Besides, Turkish tax and tax treaty systems have been compared with EU law and the OECD Model. Because the principle of non-discrimination is significant for Turkey due to being an EU candidate and applying the OECD Model in tax treaties. Moreover, some suggestions have been made for a better practice in Turkey such as involving the protection of stateless persons or the last paragraph of Article 24, reflecting the case law of the CJEU.