Income taxes

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2021

13. Income taxes

The following table presents the relationship between income tax expense or benefit and income or loss before income taxes:


(in millions)	Three months ended March 31,
	2021			2020
Income before income taxes	$	211.4		$	64.7
Income tax expense	(47.4)			(17.7)
Effective income tax rate	22.4		%	27.4		%

Income tax expense or benefit in the quarter is based upon the estimated income or loss for the full year. The composition of the income or loss in different countries and adjustments, if any, in the applicable quarterly periods influences our expense or benefit.

The relationship between pre-tax income or loss and income tax expense or benefit is greatly affected by the impact of losses for which we cannot claim a tax benefit, non-deductible expenses, and other items that increase tax expense without a relationship to income, such as withholding taxes and changes with respect to uncertain tax positions. The decrease in the effective tax rate for the three months ended March 31, 2021 when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020, is primarily related to the change in geographical distribution of our pre-tax earnings along with an increase in the tax benefit for stock-based compensation exercises recorded discretely during the period.

- Definition

The entire disclosure for income taxes. Disclosures may include net deferred tax liability or asset recognized in an enterprise's statement of financial position, net change during the year in the total valuation allowance, approximate tax effect of each type of temporary difference and carryforward that gives rise to a significant portion of deferred tax liabilities and deferred tax assets, utilization of a tax carryback, and tax uncertainties information.

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