KYIV. Sept 16 (Interfax) – Arthur Betz Laffer, the father of ‘supply-side economics’, has become the advisor on taxation issues to Natalie Jaresko, the Ukrainian minister of finance.
“As an advisor to the minister of finance, Laffer will be consulting the minister on issues concerning the implementation of tax reforms in Ukraine, which will allow the creation of a transparent and efficient taxation system that will stimulate investment, economic growth and job creation, as well as improve the quality of public services rendered for business purposes, and therefore, will give a powerful impulse for the sustainable growth of the national economy of the country,” the Ministry of Finance said in a statement on Tuesday.
The founder and head of Laffer Associates and Laffer Investments, Laffer obtained his PHD (Doctor of Philosophy) degree and later became a professor at Stanford University. He is also a professor at the University of South Carolina and the University of Chicago, the author of a theory linking state income with the average level of tax rates in the country (the ‘Laffer curve’). Laffer was once an economic advisor to U.S. President Ronald Reagan and UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
The statement also said that Slovakia’s former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Ivan Miklos, as well as international economists Chris Wales and Robert Conrad had earlier joined the team of advisors and deputies of the Ukrainian minister of finance.
