Aurélie Barnay

Transformations that aim to unlock more opportunities from e-commerce could also help customs agencies tackle issues they’ve long wrestled with, including revenue leakage and illicit goods flows.

Governments around the world have implemented a range of fiscal and debt measures to fund policy initiatives over recent decades. As a result, tax revenues as a proportion of GDP have risen four percentage points across Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries since 1980. However, many governments remain inadequately funded. Despite higher tax revenues, spending is rising faster than income, leading to widening budget deficits and higher levels of debt.

New insights from McKinsey research suggest that across the globe, tax authorities diverge in the maturity of their innovation in four areas: digitized interactions, advanced analytics, process automation, and talent management. In an age when we can order food, hail a ride, track our fitness, book a flight, and perform multiple banking activities from our smartphones, technology is shifting citizen expectations across the globe.