FAIRER SHORES: TAX HAVENS, TAX AVOIDANCE, AND CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Despite the U.S. public's tolerance of and emotional attachment to tax avoidance at the individual level, the tax avoidance practices of modern multinational corporations such as Google, Amazon, Apple, and Starbucks recently have received heavy criticism in the media. This Note argues that the doctrine of corporate social responsibility provides a logical rationale for multinational corporations to adopt antiavoidance practices, in that the harm caused by tax avoidance outweighs any financial benefit that accrues from these practices. Contrary to the views of some corporate leaders, tax avoidance can cause long-term harm to corporations and their shareholders by damaging corporate reputations and branding efforts, and also by diverting funds from national infrastructures, skewing the allocation of tax burdens, and causing harm to developing nations operating as tax havens. Fortunately, the same mechanisms that helped turn environmentally sustainable and human rights practices into corporate social responsibility "norms" - consumer activism, investor influence, and voluntary corporate leadership - also can be implemented to lead multinational corporations away from tax avoidance practices, ultimately ending the prevailing antiavoidance tax culture and reducing the harms caused by tax avoidance.