There is a widespread concern that a greater mobility of individuals can undermine any attempt to redistribute income at the local level. In this paper we derive the equilibrium level of redistribution when both the rich and the poor are mobile (although in different degrees) and when each...

Corruption, evasion and the abuse of power (and the possibility thereof) are pervasive features of economic activity. A prominent instance is tax collection. This paper examines the implications of corruptibility and the potential abuse of authority for the effects and optimal design of...

This paper examines the intragenerational redistribution aspect of social security. The level of social security is determined by majority voting between individuals who differ (ex-ante) in their earning ability and life expectancy. Given incentive effects, the voting equilibrium depends on...

Income-based targeting (or means-testing) reduces social security benefits as income rises. This form of targeting entails a well-known incentive distortion; the prospect for the recipients of losing part of their benefits if they were to earn more can deter them to work harder. In this paper,...

We consider a tax enforcement game in which the fiscal authority cannot pre-commit to an inspection policy and its interaction with the taxpayer is modelled as a signalling game. We extend earlier work by allowing for imperfect auditing, non-linear taxation and non-linear penalties. Using the...

In a context where both the poor and the rich are (imperfectly) mobile, this paper compares the Nash equilibrium levels of income redistribution from the rich to the poor when jurisdictions compete either in taxes, in transfers or both. Although taxes and transfers are linked through the...

We study optimal tax policies in a life-cycle economy with risky human capital and permanent ability differences, where both ability and learning effort are private information of the agents. The optimal policies balance several goals: redistribution across agents, insurance against human...

We run experiments with a stag hunt and bargaining coordination game. Using a between-subjects design, we vary the identity of the opponent between someone of the same culture or a different culture. The idea is to see whether cultural norms or identity play a part in coordination decisions. We...

This paper studies the impact of ambiguity in the best shot and weakest link models of public good provision. The models are ?rst analysed theoretically. Then we conduct experiments to study how ambiguity affects behaviour in these games. We test whether subjects? perception of ambiguity differs...

We study the role of village-level religious fragmentation on intra- and inter-group cooperation in India. We report on data on two-player Prisoners’ Dilemma and Stag Hunt experiments played by 516 Hindu and Muslim participants in rural India. Our treatments are the identity of the two players...