Uncovering Women in Taxation: The Gender Impact of Detaxation, Tax Expenditures, and Joint Tax/Benefit Units

Women have made great progress in gaining individual civil and political rights since the 1800s. However, for nearly a century, the use of couple-based tax and benefit provisions has increased steadily, enshrouding women in new and extensive forms of fiscal coverture that run counter to democratic ideals of economic equality. While the pros and cons of joint taxation have been well-rehearsed, the reality is that between unequal distributions of new and old varieties of tax and benefit items to women and men and the continued expansion of joint tax and benefit items in recent decades, Canada’s tax and transfer system now diverts substantial amounts of money away from women and into the hands of male taxpayers or back into government coffers. This article demonstrates how fiscal systems now reinforce and intensify deeply-embedded patterns of gender-specific appropriations of women’s labour, incomes, and government benefits, and proposes that it is time to implement fully individualized fiscal policies