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Optimal policy rules--including those regarding income taxation, commodity taxation, public goods, and externalities--are typically derived in models with homogeneous preferences. This article reconsiders many central results for the case in which preferences for commodities, public goods, and...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005084879
productivity, to study the efficient degree of consumption inequality in the long run. In our environment a utilitarian planner … allows for consumption inequality even when labor productivity is public information. We show that adding private information …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005036789
A substantial literature examines second-best environmental policy, focusing particularly on how the Pigouvian directive that marginal taxes should equal marginal external harms needs to be modified in light of the preexisting distortion due to labor income taxation. Additional literature is...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005575754
If individuals evaluate outcomes relative to the status quo, then a social planner may limit redistribution from rich … know (when we observe near-complete redistribution). Subjects who are themselves risk-seeking over losses drive the effect … suggest that respect for reference points of the wealthy may help explain why voters demand less redistribution than standard …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011196766
-led redistribution and greater acceptance of wage inequality (e.g., United States versus Western Europe). If individual nations evolve …-led redistribution to the poor. These patterns suggest that short-run inequality shocks can be reinforced in the labor market but do not …In cross-sectional studies, countries with greater income inequality typically exhibit less support for government …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10009395461
rates, inequality, and income redistribution. We also extend that model to incorporate social preferences in the form of … altruism and inequality aversion. The experiment varies the amount of inequality and the collective choice procedure to … determine tax rates. We report four main findings. First, higher wage inequality leads to higher tax rates. The effect is …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010821742
A basic tenet of economics posits that when consumers or firms don't face the true social cost of their actions, market outcomes are inefficient. In the case of negative externalities, Pigouvian taxes are one way to correct this market failure, where the optimal tax leads agents to internalize...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010951204
Starting with Vickrey (1945) and Mirrlees (1971), the optimal tax literature has studied the design of a personal income tax. The assumed ideal would be to tax earnings ability. Earnings ability is unobservable for tax purposes, however. Past papers have focused instead on designing a tax on...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010951217
This paper examines the optimal setting of environmental taxes in economies where other, distortionary taxes are present. We employ analytical and numerical models to explore the degree to which, in a second best economy, optimal environmental tax rates differ from the rates implied by the...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005248832
The strength of the behavioral response to a tax rate change depends on the environment individuals operate in, and may be manipulated by instruments controlled by the government. We first derive a measure of the social benefit to affecting this elasticity. The paper then examines this effect in...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005087478