Abstract
This paper is based on the endless discussions over tax competition. While the discussions over harmless tax competition and harmful tax competition are not yet closed, one of the key issues that adds on is the distinctive boundaries between the two. That is the focus of this paper, which suggests that, with respect to State tax sovereignty, any tax competition done to attract genuine investment is harmless. Equally is a tax competition whose tools do not make a distinction between residents and non-residents. In contrast, tax competition with ring-fenced tools and tax competition that aims at poaching other countries’ tax baseslook prima facieharmful.Without claiming having exhaustively drawn the boundaries, this paper contributes to the discussions over the distinction between harmless and harmful tax competition by shedding the light on some elements distinguishing harmless from harmful tax competition.